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WHAT 

II 



DE FELLENBERG 



HAS DONE 



FOR 



EDUCATION. 



LONDON: 

SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, CONDUIT STREET. 

1839. 



y 



LONDON : 
PRINTED BY LEVEY, KOBSOIN, AND FIUM&LYM, 

46 St. Martin's Laue. 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 






v^ 



The name of De Fellenberg is familiar to all the 
civilised nations of Europe and North America, and 
may now be mentioned without offence. This ex- 
pression implies that it once was otherwise. Yes ; 
the age in which he has lived having been one of 
political storms, every name which was eminent 
enough to appear above the surface of the troubled 
waters was claimed or denounced by a party ; none 
could escape. Even those who disclaimed all party, 
but who, from the highest motives, thought they 
were bound not to live for themselves alone, nor 
to hide their talent in a napkin, but to labour, like 
the holy men of old, according to the light given 
them, for the permanent good of their fellow-crea- 
tures, were exposed to a moral martyrdom, from 
the ignorance, misconception, and hostility of their 
contemporaries. 

Schools and education had certainly been heard 



Vi INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

of from the times of Rome and Greece — had not been 
totally destroyed at the fall of the Empire — and had 
in a degree revived with the revival of learning : but 
the kind of education which Fellenberg contem- 
plated, with its application to the lowest as well as 
the highest class of society, was so new, that it is 
still a novelty in enlightened England, after his forty 
years' experimental labours at Hofwyl. The great 
object to which he had determined to devote his life 
was the practical solution of the question, whether 
it is possible to influence and form the human cha- 
racter by early discipline and instruction ; to set the 
motives, feelings, and passions, in a proper course ; 
to fix in the mind moral and religious principles, 
giving rise to corresponding habits of action; to 
store the mind with just ideas, and the heart with 
Christian sentiments. He wished to raise the school 
from a mere technical system to one of intelligence ; 
and from a place of irksome constraint to one of 
pleasing and beneficial occupations. 

As these objects had never been attained, nor 
even attempted, with a direct, specific, and undi- 
vided purpose, Fellenberg's wise and benevolent 
plans for the improvement of character were looked 
at as dangerous innovations in the usual mode of 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. Vll 

bringing up the young, and as connected with some 
deep, secret plot for the subversion of society. He 
had, therefore, to contend, during many years, with 
a combination of ignorance, prejudice, and, we fear 
we must add, in some instances, of malignity. Before 
his time, almost the only medium of instruction for 
the people was the pulpit ; almost the only means of 
discipline, of training and forming character, were 
domestic ; which domestic training consisted in a 
short * intercourse between parent and child at cer- 
tain hours of the day, when labour was over ; and 
in permitting the children, during the rest of the 
day, to wander at large in the streets of towns, or 
the fields of the country, encouraging each other to 
vice and impiety. It was this pernicious training 
which Fellenberg proposed to supersede by one of 
order, method, and discipline ; to put useful employ- 
ment in the place of mischievous idleness, and hourly 
Christian instruction and superintendence in the place 
of total neglect and ignorance. Was such a scheme 
feasible ? and if so, would it not be better and more 
Christian than the former state of things ? 

Fellenberg was led to study this question in con- 
sequence of observing the state of Europe, at that 
time convulsed by the French revolution. The am- 



Vlll INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

bition of political power was the moving principle of 
the few, to which the many were made subservient ; 
and the lives of all, instead of being passed in the ex- 
ercise of peaceful virtues, with the hope and expec- 
tation of a better world, were exhausted in the rage 
and passions of savages. Fellenberg groaned over 
this exhibition of human ferocity, — over the social 
ruin which it occasioned, — over the total absence of 
Christian character which it betrayed. He beheld 
Christian men, as they called themselves, tearing 
one another to pieces, and for no ostensible good, — 
the mere instruments of the few ringleaders of the 
world's misery. Human nature seemed to have dis- 
carded all virtue, and to have become the receptacle 
of that assemblage of vices denounced by the apostle 
— " envy, variance, wrath, strife, hatred, sedition, 
drunkenness, revellings, adultery, murder." 

Fellenberg at first imagined that something might 
be done among the rulers of mankind, the directors 
of the political storm, to calm this turbulent state, 
and to introduce harmony into this chaos; but he 
found them totally indifferent and apathetic, and 
blind to all but the scene in which they lived. 
Every man forms a horizon for himself by his 
actions, thoughts, and reading. The demagogue 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. IX 

sees nothing but the mob before him ; the soldier, 
nothing but the battle ; the politician, often, espe- 
cially in troublous times, nothing but the intrigues 
around him. None but the Christian philanthropist 
can take an enlarged view of man in his present and 
future hopes — his social condition, his capabilities 
of improvement, the possible extent of happiness or 
misery for which he may be born. The Bible pre- 
sents him with the ideal perfectibility of universal 
man - inspiring those who drink deep into its spirit 
with high and noble hopes for the welfare of hu- 
manity, and with an ardent desire to promote it ; 
while those who are wholly absorbed in the business 
of life remain pagans in a Christian age, and all 
their ideas of man are mean, low, and perishing : 
to them man still continues " a brute that perishes." 
Fellenberg, therefore, found no sympathy from the 
statesmen of his day ; they were callous to the com- 
mon social rights of states and of men, as well as 
indifferent to all views and projects of moral im* 
provement. In fact, what does the mere politician, 
whether demagogue or tyrant, require of man, but 
to be a blind instrument in his ambitious grasp ? 
He wishes his follower to have enough mind to 
direct his physical strength most effectually accord- 



X INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

ing to the command of a superior, but no more. It 
is the enlightened politician — the legislator properly 
so called — who considers man not as a tool with 
which he is to work, but as a ward committed to his 
charge, and for whose character, usefulness, and 
happiness, he will be held responsible at the day of 
judgment. 

Fellenberg living in such an age of vice, im- 
piety, and misery, felt keenly the degradation and 
corruption of man ; and also that this was no new 
state of things, though an aggravated one. He saw 
that Europe had never been practically Christianised ; 
that she had been converted from paganism little 
more than in name; and that her barbarism had 
never been extirpated. He beheld in history a 
swarm of nations issuing from savage forests, con- 
quering a comparatively civilised nation, separating 
into feudalities, continuing their wars with each 
other, ignorant of letters, studying no art or science 
but that of the sword. The outbreakings of modern 
revolutions were nothing but a continuance of the 
history of the race. It was no new or sudden vol- 
cano, acting by new and unknown laws : the causes 
were deeply laid in the ignorance and barbarism of 
the people, and in the pugnacious and arbitrary prin- 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XI 

-ciples of the rulers. We are not here questioning 
the providential wisdom of the history of man, as 
shewn in the European march from barbarism and 
paganism to civilisation, Christianity, and rational 
and constitutional liberty : but we cannot insist too 
strongly upon our pristine barbarism and ignorance, 
and the total want of any general moral means of 
removing them, beyond the formalities of religion ; 
lest it should be imagined that the mass of the 
people among our ancestors were in possession of 
ample and efficient means of moral and religious 
instruction. 

Fellenberg was one of the few who traced the 
tumults and troubles of his age to the moral de- 
pravity of men in their social relations. With the 
Bible in his hand, and an enlightened philosophy in 
his heart, he considered society and men as they 
were in fact, as they ought to be as Christians, and 
as they might be under a proper guidance and sys- 
tem of early discipline and instruction. Unlike 
others who had preceded him, but with partial and 
theoretic views of the subject, he did not propound 
his ideas to the public in writing ; but, convinced 
of the truth, power, and force of the principles he 
had arrived at, he determined upon submitting them 



Xll INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

to the test of an experiment, to which he pledged his 
talents, property, and life, — and for so doing was 
denounced as the enemy of his race ! 

The improvement of mankind in the arts of civi- 
lisation seems to be under laws of more certain, or, 
rather, more rapid operation, than their improvement 
in morals. The civilisation of arts seems to be first 
attained ; that of intellect next ; and that of morals 
last of all. Indeed, the two former may advance 
while the latter seems to retrograde. This was the 
case among the early Eastern nations, and among 
the Greeks and Romans : so much so, that it be- 
came a kind of philosophical proverb, that when 
nations had attained to what was then deemed their 
highest point of so-called civilisation and refinement, 
they retrograded and declined by a natural necessity. 
The most civilised nations of Europe seem to have 
attained, during the last century, about the same 
degree of refinement which belonged to Greece and 
Rome in their best days. They were great in arms, 
arts, oratory, and poetry ; but they had not improved 
in morals in an equal degree. They had, indeed, 
theoretically a better religion ; but the superstitions 
of barbarous times were not worn out, the reforma- 
tion of a corrupt creed was only partially effected ; 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. Xlll 

and the peculiar sublimity of the Christian code of 
morals, the conquest over the selfish principle of 
man, and the exaltation of his motives into a de- 
pendence upon Divine direction and assistance, 
opening to him a field of progressive and infinite 
improvement, were almost unknown. Vice abounded 
in all classes of society, according to the circum- 
stances, opportunities, and temptations of each ; and 
the few holy characters which were scattered through 
the mass, seemed to be entirely isolated, and to exert 
no leavening process upon the surrounding crowds. 
At one time, vice was the test of loyalty, as piety 
was of disaffection ; and the spread of infidelity was 
by some considered as a sign of national prosperity. 
We venture to say, that these feelings and judgments 
are not yet extinct. In our own age, it has been 
scarcely creditable to belong to Bible or missionary 
societies ; and infant-schools were once considered 
as the nurseries of freethinkers, or as the visionary 
projects of Utopian philanthropists. It seemed to 
be absolutely necessary that mankind should expe- 
rience practically the utmost horrors, misery, and 
anarchy of vice and ignorance, and have that expe- 
rience reiterated upon them generation after genera- 
tion, before they could be convinced of the inherent 



XIV INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

and indefeasible malignity of vice, and of the sublime 
beauty of holiness. The French revolution did in- 
deed strike terror into the hearts of men, and made 
crime at length detestable. Not that it was the first 
or only consequence of vicious principles which Eu- 
rope had witnessed — far from it — for she was bred 
in war and rapine ; but vice appeared in a new garb, 
and less under the direction of its usual leaders. 
Still, the horror that was felt was more political than 
moral. Men feared the miseries of vice as exhibited 
in public convulsions ; but they continued blind to 
its effects on social and domestic happiness. Provided 
the state were free from change, they cared not for 
the tears shed in secret over the degradation of pri- 
vate infamy. Another step was necessary in the 
moral demonstration; which was, that public pro- 
sperity and security should be deemed to be utterly 
incompatible with private vice. 

To arrive practically at this momentous conclu- 
sion is a great era in the history of man, because it 
leads at once to a practical inquiry of an experi- 
mental kind ; and when men are once bent upon 
an experimental pursuit, universal experience proves 
that their labours will be rewarded with a rich 
harvest. 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XV 

Slow are men to be convinced of the importance 
and necessity of moral character to the security and 
prosperity of states ; but slower still are they to dis- 
cover in what way that moral character can be 
attained. The subject of the formation of character 
among the mass of mankind is altogether new. The 
characters of men have been formed in past times by 
national circumstances, and not at all by artificial 
means. By artificial means, we understand schools. 
There are only two means of forming character — 
the domestic hearth and the school. The former is 
evidently suited only to nations in a barbarous or 
semi-barbarous state. When men have advanced to 
a certain point of civilisation, the parents among the 
mass of the people are too much occupied in their 
daily callings to be able to influence their children 
sufficiently. The children then cease to imbibe the 
instructions or character of the parent, and come 
under the irregular and mischievous influence of 
each other ; the parents also themselves, in passing 
from the barbarous to the civilised state, contract 
the vices peculiar to the latter. Every state of so- 
ciety is harassed by its peculiar vices, of which the 
mass are the victims. The domestic teaching, there- 
fore, soon becomes worse than nothing — it is only a 



XVI INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

name. Under that name, the children of neigh- 
bouring families herd together, and contaminate 
each other. The character of man is habit : what, 
then, more fatal than the association of human 
beings, without the practice of virtue and prudence ; 
without self-denial and experience ; full of passion 
and irregular desire ; and without control and dis- 
cipline ? Profligacy and recklessness must be the 
inevitable consequences. If there were not some 
unknown check upon this state of society, some 
providential superintendence, permitting all evils to 
have a certain sway and no more, with a view to 
the ultimate extermination of evil through its own 
odiousness, we should be filled with despair at the 
moral prospects of man under such circumstances, 
and foresee nothing but increasing vice and increas- 
ing political convulsion. 

We have said, that parents, as soon as society 
passes from the barbarous state to the pursuit of 
arts, are totally incompetent to educate their own 
children, and that the artificial education of the 
school must commence. This is true of all classes 
of society, as well as of the lowest. Education be- 
comes an art, as well as the manufacture of articles 
of consumption. It becomes subject to the law of 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XV11 

the division of labour; and they who engage in it 
will excel in it by the same necessity that a mechanic 
excels in his peculiar occupation. Upon this prin- 
ciple, schools become necessary for all classes, to 
supply the want of time, attention, and knowledge, 
in parents ^f all ranks. If mankind had been capable 
of anticipating and foreseeing their own wants before 
they were pressed upon them by a painful expe- 
rience, schools and schoolmasters would have been 
coeval with the first transition from a state of bar- 
barian war to one of incipient civilisation and the 
cultivation of the arts. But man cannot foresee, and 
can only learn by pain and sorrow how to obviate 
the recurrence of similar suffering. The formation 
of character by means of schools, — i.e. by means 
of systematic discipline and instruction, — is a new 
thought. Schools were first established for other 
purposes; and when established, the formation of 
character was not an element in their system, nor 
is it so yet. Schools were established for the sake 
of mere knowledge ; for cultivating the intellect, not 
the heart. The progress of society required a cer- 
tain number of persons who could read and write, 
in order to fill, in church and state, certain offices 
which had sprung up from the necessities of society ; 



XV111 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

and it was long before these necessities were really 
supplied. Of those who were thus educated, some 
turned their attention to literature and general know- 
ledge, and thus opened a new field for the employ- 
ment of the human mind — afield of mere abstract 
knowledge and speculation, totally unconnected with 
practical purposes. 

But by the same condition that the practical 
position of government and of the church required 
that a certain number of persons should receive 
what was called a learned education, the position 
of affairs in the middle classes of society also began 
to make some education appear desirable. Persons 
were not fitted to carry on the common business of 
life without a certain amount of instruction ; and as 
only one kind was to be had, men were obliged to 
send their children to the schools which happened 
to be in existence. These schools were all of the 
same character : the subjects taught, and the mode 
of teaching, were the same, whatever condition of 
life the pupils were intended for; and this system 
was a necessary one under the circumstances, be- 
cause some of the scholars being intended for the 
learned professions, as they were called, became the 
principal objects of the master's care. He adapted 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XIX 

his system to them ; and the others were obliged to 
follow it, and to make the best of it, though it might 
not be the best preparation for them and their pro- 
fessions> as it was supposed to be for others. 

In order to understand the history of schools, 
and to make allowance for the defects of the early 
ones, and through this history to improve our own, 
we must consider that the early schools were con- 
fined in the materials they had to work with. 
These were few and scanty both in kind and degree. 
Every science and art had to be discovered before 
it could be taught : grammar and logic, geography 
and maps, arithmetic, geometry, and natural philo- 
sophy, elementary history, the mythology of the 
classics, illustrations of manners and customs, dic- 
tionaries, — every thing had to be constructed ; so 
that it is wonderful what and how the early schools 
contrived to teach. The subjects taught, and the 
mode of teaching, had to undergo a progress of dis- 
covery and improvement, like all other sciences. It 
might have been expected, the teachers should have 
discovered what they were most in want of; but we 
should bear in mind, that their time and thoughts 
are occupied not in discovering, but in teaching. 
Many of the most important materials of teaching 



XX INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

are derived from other professions. The teacher 
only selects and concentrates what he finds useful 
to his purpose. The early schools, of necessity 
exceedingly imperfect, have unfortunately entailed 
their imperfections upon their successors. The 
objects they contemplated were unfavourable to 
enlarged views, or to any thing like an educational 
system. With them education was a mere appren- 
ticeship to the learned languages — a mere trade, 
not a science. They professed to teach one thing, 
and one thing only, the grammatical elements of 
Latin, and, perhaps, of Greek. We say elements, 
because that degree of teaching which consists in 
writing and speaking those languages with facility, 
has hardly yet been attained in any school. This 
leads us to consider a wonderful fact, that, though 
every child learns to talk his own language while he 
is a child, yet, after ten years' teaching of the Latin 
or Greek language, the scholar has not learnt to 
speak, and scarcely to write it. The withering 
effects of this contracted system of teaching, this 
limiting of instruction to Greek and Latin, were not 
so much felt in the higher departments of society, 
for which it was chiefly intended, because such in- 
struction occupied only a portion of a long period 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XXI 

of pupilage, and because no other knowledge or 
science was required in some of the professions; 
while in others, personal labour and perseverance 
made up for all deficiencies of elementary teaching. 
And we must never forget that the innate powers, 
faculties, and principles of the human mind, are not 
to be judged of by the results of any teaching which 
has hitherto prevailed. Teaching cannot create : 
mind is a creation. Teaching is only moulding that 
which already exists ; and this moulding, if not con- 
ducted skilfully, and agreeably with the original laws 
and intentions of the Creator, will only deface his 
work, instead of bringing it to its intended perfec- 
tion. The mind of original ability and talent, there- 
fore, made its way amid all difficulties, and amid the 
vices of all teaching, to its proper station in the 
world of mind, and was no proof of any excellence 
in the system under which it was trained. With the 
majority of minds it was far different. A contracted 
and dry system was to them a second nature, and 
frustrated the first which they had received at 
birth; and the faults of the teaching were imputed to 
the original creation. Thus nature became libelled 
by the very persons who ought to have worshipped 
her : the beauties they had defaced were pronounced 
b 



XX11 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

never to have existed, and the distortions of art were 
asserted to be natural deformities. 

The incurable and ruinous consequences of this 
contracted system were seen and first remedied in 
the profession of arms. As the art of war became 
a science, and dependent upon mind more than upon 
brute force, real knowledge, a knowledge of arith- 
metic and geometry, became the only basis upon 
which it could be erected. Government was there- 
fore obliged to establish schools of its own, adapted 
to its purpose ; not merely schools for completing 
education, analogous to universities, but elementary 
schools for teaching the simplest properties of num- 
bers and space. When other persons demanded that 
these elements should be made a part of teaching in 
schools, they were pronounced unnecessary and use- 
less, except for certain mechanic arts. When admitted, 
they were taught by permission rather than upon 
principle, and a certain air of contempt was thrown 
over them. Elements upon which depended the per- 
fection of the art of war and national security and 
independence, and upon which the whole fabric of 
the universe was created, were pronounced to be con- 
temptible, and are still held in all the higher English 
schools to be of very inferior importance. 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XX111 

The middling classes of society also at length 
perceived the imperfect and inadequate teaching of 
the schools. At the age when parents were obliged 
to remove their children from school, they found 
them not only deficient in all knowledge calculated 
to prove practically useful in the employments for 
which they were destined, but even in that to which 
their time had been solely devoted. Not to have been 
taught useful practical knowledge, was an evil ; but 
not to have been taught that which alone had been 
attempted, was more serious still. These middling 
classes, however, had not the power, like govern- 
ment, of correcting these evils : they could not esta- 
blish schools and professorships of their own ; neither 
their time nor their funds allowed of it. They were 
compelled to accept what the schools offered, and to 
make the best of it. Fortunately the consequences, 
however injurious, were not so fatal as they would 
have proved in the other case, had that also been 
without a remedy. Inferior and limited teaching 
rendered them a less intelligent class of people, less 
skilful in their employments, less capable of im- 
proving their situation and circumstances, less useful 
members of the community, with fewer resources, 
fewer means of self-recreation and rational amuse- 



XXIV INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

ment, and left their moral character much lower 
than it ought to have been ; but it did not expose 
these classes to absolute ruin, as would have been 
the case with the nation, had government not taken 
the education of its military servants out of the 
hands of the common schools. 

We have called the schools of former days a sys- 
tem of mere teaching, because of their confined plan, 
objects, and attainments; we have now to consider 
what they were as places of education. School and 
education are thought to be synonymous terms ; and 
so they ought to be — but so it has not been. Educa- 
tion is a term of wide signification, and will not 
apply, except in a most qualified manner, to any 
narrow or partial system. A system which merely 
proposes to teach one particular art, science, or lan- 
guage, is not an education, except in a very loose 
acceptation. All the early period of life, up to the 
time when a person enters upon a profession or a 
business, is the period of education. In whatever 
way he may be taught or managed during that pe- 
riod, that teaching and management is called his 
education, however imperfect or even objectionable 
it may be. In one sense, every thing which happens 
to a person, from the cradle to the period of his 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XXV 

entering on active and responsible life, may be very 
justly called his education ; because, by all those 
circumstances, whatever they may be, whether good 
or bad, favourable or unfavourable, in a school or 
out of a school, private or public, his habits and 
character are formed, and he becomes a good or 
bad member of society. But true education contem- 
plates the whole man, — not one faculty alone, but 
all his faculties, powers, feelings, and principles ; so 
that the word is of wide import, and may include 
either the very highest or the very lowest set of cir- 
cumstances in which a human being may be brought 
up. It is necessary to bear in mind this expansive 
meaning of the term, because it affects every argu- 
ment on the subject, and entirely alters its com- 
plexion, according as it is applied to the higher or 
lower classes of the community. Thus a person who 
has low and contracted ideas of education will call 
any school -instruction an education, however few 
may be the subjects taught, or however imperfect 
the method of teaching. In speaking of even the 
highest schools, he will consider their education per- 
fect, because they stand high in public estimation, 
without inquiring into the details of the system fol- 
lowed, or its effect upon the character and prin- 



XXVI INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

ciples. Some people have no idea of any education 
beyond the bare teaching of the classics, and will 
hence condemn the education of the lower classes ; 
as if there was nothing else which they might pro- 
fitably learn, and as if education had nothing to do 
with the formation of character independently of 
learning Latin and Greek. 

To have a worthy conception of all that is meant 
by the term education, we must not be content with 
a dictionary, and call it with Johnson, " the instruc- 
tion of children ;" but we must consider what man 
is in his original and divine faculties, what is the 
calling for which he is destined in this life, and what 
are the ultimate expectations and responsibilities of 
his being in the life to come. Education brings out 
all the faculties of man with a view to the two 
great ends of his being, both present and future ; 
to his own personal happiness, and to the good of 
society. If there is one feature in education more 
prominent than another, it is this, that it involves 
moral and religious character more than intellect. 
It is the connexion of education with character, and 
the great dependence of the one upon the other, 
which renders the subject of universal interest and 
of unbounded importance. 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XXVU 

This view of education has only of late began 
to be generally taken. The early schools were en- 
tirely intellectual. They proposed to themselves only 
the cultivation of the intellectual powers, talents, and 
abilities, in a restricted sense ; and they only attempted 
to educate for the demands of the day, which were 
some knowledge of the Latin and Greek languages. 
There was a historical reason for this : the records 
of revelation were enclosed in these languages; 
those records could only be understood and fairly 
estimated by the study of their languages. They 
had been the mother-tongue of the first disciples of 
the religion, and of the great works of the first 
scholars, and orators, and, we might almost say, 
philosophers, which had adorned it. They contained 
what may be called its early literature and external 
history. When, therefore, our Germanic forefathers 
were sufficiently civilised to begin the acquisition of 
literature, they were compelled, by the moral necessity 
of circumstances, to cultivate the Latin and Greek lan- 
guages ; and schools were compelled, in like manner, 
to make those languages their principal, if not their 
only subject of instruction. Thus education became 
identified with the study of those two languages, 
and the name and thing were defined in accordance 



XXVlil INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

with this narrow, but, at that period, not unim- 
portant purpose. To teach them, was to educate ; 
and to be educated, was to have been at a school 
where they were taught. After the demand for per- 
sons so educated had been supplied, and persons 
intended for other professions, and for the middle 
walks of life, began to frequent these schools — and 
after some other kinds of knowledge began to creep 
into them, — as such knowledge grew up in the 
world, and came also into demand, the same intel- 
lectual character continued to possess the schools. 
The training of the moral habits was not con- 
sidered to be the chief, or even a leading end to 
be aimed at. 

The same necessity which compelled persons 
who were intended for the higher professions to 
study Latin and Greek, compelled other classes to 
make different acquisitions of knowledge. Thus read- 
ing, writing, and the first elements of numbers, be- 
came absolutely necessary for a certain number of 
people of all classes, as the affairs of common life 
became more complicated, and as trade and com- 
merce extended. Schools, therefore, for teaching 
these elements alone, descended to the lowest ranks, 
from which indeed — such was the demand for this 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XXlX 

knowledge — many persons arose, who, by ability, 
industry, and perseverance, attained to wealth and 
celebrity, and laid the foundation of influential fami- 
lies in the kingdom. But the numbers of such 
schools were still small compared with the whole 
population, and worldly utility was the chief end 
proposed in them both by master and scholar. How 
it happened that so much time was consumed in 
making such trifling attainments, may now appear 
extraordinary; but the art of teaching was in its 
infancy, and consisted chiefly in giving children an 
opportunity of teaching themselves, rather than in 
directing or contributing to their acquirements. The 
greater part of the school-time was occupied in doing 
nothing. Children were confined within doors during 
certain hours, whether occupied or not; and with 
this so-called teaching all parties were satisfied, if 
we except the scholars, who, employed upon dull, 
irksome, and often unintelligible tasks, never tasted 
the sweets of knowledge, of which none was im- 
parted — did not feel, that, even in their avowed 
studies, they made any progress, and therefore con- 
sidered school only as a species of imprisonment. 

The last half century has seen such changes in 
European society, manners, habits, education, arts, 



^XXX INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

and sciences, as cannot be paralleled in the history 
of mankind. One of its grandest features has been 
a moral one : it has been the era of Bibles. In all 
ages of the Christian dispensation, missionaries have 
been sent forth, more or less, to announce the glad 
tidings of salvation to all lands ; but in none has the 
Bible itself been sent forth to be its own herald, 
with or without the accompanying missionary, with 
the same zeal or to the same extent. In no former 
age had it been felt, that nations of professing Chris- 
tians might be enveloped in pagan darkness as 
much as those who never heard the name of Christ ; 
and that the possession, and therefore the spirit of 
the Bible, was in many Christian places as rare as 
in pagan land. This was a great moral discovery, 
however strong the term may appear to be ; and the 
men who could make and feel the value of that dis- 
covery possessed no ordinary mind and heart, and 
were an earnest of the moral spirit which was awa- 
kening from its slumbers. This spirit could not fail 
to diffuse itself into all those subjects which con- 
cern the character, happiness, and improvement 
of man. It should have been watched, appreciated, 
and directed, instead of being confounded with a 
mere revolutionary mania. If, indeed, this spirit 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XXXI 

had not sprung up, all Europe would probably 
have run the same course of " decline and fall" 
as did the empires of old. The Bible stood be- 
tween us and the precipice, and saved the world 
politically, as the divine Author of Christianity had 
saved it morally. 

It was this moral spirit which prompted the edu- 
cation of the people at large — of the lowest order of 
society, as they have been called. Education had 
begun to spread among this class beyond the mere 
demand for it of which we have spoken ; but it was 
expensive, and extremely imperfect, even in impart- 
ing the trifling elements of reading, writing, and 
arithmetic. The importance, however, of this degree 
of education, as the handmaid of religion and mo- 
rality, was beginning to be perceived ; and though 
the ostensible object was principally the acquisition 
of the elements of knowledge, the real object was 
an ulterior one — namely, the improvement of cha- 
racter, and the acquisition of Christian instruction. 
When it was discovered that, by proper arrange- 
ments, one master might teach the elements to three 
hundred, or even five hundred children, as perfectly 
as to a few, the moral spirit of the day was roused 
to carry such a system into practice ; and the mag- 



XXXU INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

nificent idea occurred of giving to every Christian, 
child a Christian education. 

The era of popular education had therefore begun 
— it was the companion of the Bible era. Both had 
the same object in view ; the moral improvement of 
all mankind, of the universal race, as far as might 
be permitted by the conditions of this imperfect 
stage of existence. The one was the foundation, the 
other the superstructure; the one was the light of 
the world, the other the guide by which that light 
was, humanly speaking, to be reached and disse- 
minated. 

But the schools established upon this principle 
could imitate at first none but those which preceded 
them in their immediate object, which was, as we 
have said, more intellectual than moral. They pro- 
posed to improve the methods of attaining the ele- 
ments of knowledge; and though the Bible was 
introduced as a class-book, yet the mode in which 
it was read partook more of an intellectual than of 
a moral exercise. Spelling-lessons were made from 
it, and detached parts were extracted for reading- 
lessons, which lost much of their force by being 
separated from the context; and sometimes sen- 
tences were associated for the mere purpose of 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XXX1U 

learning to read, having no connexion in sense with 
each other. Besides, it is very possible to learn to 
spell and read, without having any comprehension of 
the sense. At this day, the children of those who 
speak the Gaelic language in Scotland are taught 
to read English fluently, without understanding it. 
The effects of these schools, therefore, were less 
perfect than had been anticipated, though as good 
as, under all the circumstances, could be expected 
by those who had a practical knowledge of early 
education, and of the intricacies of the human mind, 
and of the numerous difficulties to be overcome, 
before the results of education can be reduced to 
any thing like certainty. An opinion is now very 
generally gaining ground, that these schools have 
not attained all that was desirable, and that their 
methods require and are susceptible of improve- 
ment — that they have been too exclusively intel- 
lectual and mechanical — that they do not suffi- 
ciently influence the moral habits, and therefore 
the religious principles of the children. The term 
education is beginning to be understood in its full 
and legitimate sense, as affecting the whole character 
of the man, moral as well as intellectual, but prin- 
cipally the former ; that its great end and aim should 



XXXIV INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

be to form good practical principles and habits, 
and not great readers or arithmeticians : and these 
ideas have spread from the lower to the higher 
schools. Men may be useful and happy with in- 
ferior literary attainments, but not with inferior 
moral principles and habits. The miseries of the 
world in past ages have been occasioned by its vices, 
not by its ignorance of languages, arts, and sciences, 
any farther than as the latter may influence the 
former. There is a growing conviction that the 
great antidote to vice and crime, and therefore to 
political disturbances, is to be found in an improved 
moral education in the mass of the people. 

We have thus traced the history of education 
in Europe, according to our own impressions of it, 
because the principles of such subjects are only to 
be found in their history. Imagination is fond of 
looking forward to the future in its own poetic 
dreams, without studying the past; but the true 
future can only be seen in the past, of which it is 
the necessary consequence. The facts of past ages 
contain the moral laws of man, as determined by 
his Creator ; and the sagacious development of those 
laws indicates the finger of Providence. The history 
of schools must not be looked at merely in them- 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XXXV 

selves, but as proofs of the character of the succes- 
sive ages ; and by studying the demands of this 
character in past ages, we may foretell, to a certain 
extent, its future demands. Schools, as well as all 
other institutions, are formed by the general cha- 
racter of the times, which is in a great measure 
independent of all things but itself. While it acts 
on all things, it is no doubt reacted upon by them, 
in a degree; but it is itself the great mainspring, 
the great source of vitality. Man was made to 
govern the world and to serve his Maker ; and for 
both purposes he must have an original independent 
character stamped upon him, the law of which is 
self-expansive, both in the individual and in the 
mass, advancing from generation to generation, 
" conquering and to conquer." We have demon- 
strable proof of this both in philosophy and in reve- 
lation ; for revelation was evidently intended to bring 
man from a state of pagan barbarism into one of 
civilisation and social blessings — to carry him be- 
yond what any mere social institutions could do — 
to give him new springs of action from within him- 
self — to raise him to a sense of his individual im- 
portance in the sight of his Maker-^to give him 
a more penetrating moral eye, and a wider moral 



XXXVI INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

horizon — to elevate him from matter to spirit, from 
sense to mind, from the impure and the grovelling 
to the pure, the holy, and the sublime, — and to 
make the mortal and finite forgotten in the immortal 
and the infinite. 
V Let us now apply the preceding considerations 
to the character of Fellenberg. It is about thirty 
years since the idea of popular education took root 
in this country ; and it is only as yesterday that the 
full meaning of the term education, as implying the 
formation of principles and character, began to be 
understood; but it is forty years since the subject 
was viewed by Fellenberg in all its bearings and 
importance. To arrive at his conclusions, to satisfy 
himself of the improvableness of man, and of the 
methods by which such possible improvement was 
to be attained, required great honesty of mind, 
strong religious principles, a genuine philanthropy 
and gospel-love of his fellow-creatures, great know- 
ledge of the principles of human nature, a thorough 
sense and conviction of the deplorable moral state 
of man, a deep philosophical spirit, and a perfect 
disinterestedness. It was necessary that he should 
look into himself for all the resources of which he 
had need. He could obtain help from no one : he 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XXXV11 

eould even obtain sympathy from no one. His 
views, when proposed to others, would appear fan- 
ciful, Utopian, and impracticable. If they had been 
simple and obvious, he would not have been the 
first to entertain them. For the very reason that 
he was the first to conceive the practical improve- 
ment of mankind, he was not understood; not 
being understood, he was misrepresented and at- 
tacked. This is no new circumstance in the his- 
tory of man; ignorance, misconception, misrepre- 
sentation, opposition, hatred, persecution, follow each 
other in a necessary order. The passions of men 
follow their motives, their motives follow their know- 
ledge." Ignorance therefore necessarily produces bad 
motives, and bad motives rouse bad passions. The 
enumeration and classification of motives, and the 
inculcation of good ones as the basis of character, 
had not yet entered into the conception of edu- 
cators, except of Fellenberg. But Fellenberg was 
not to be daunted or deterred by any obstacles, phy- 
sical or moral. He trusted in the soundness of his 
principles, in the holiness of his cause, and in the 
order of Providence. His feelings, motives, and 
principles, were fundamentally and essentially reli- 
gious, though in working them out he appeared to 



XXXV111 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

be following a philosophical scheme, and to depend 
upon philosophical means and principles. This 
general mistake respecting his views and motives 
arose from the extremely imperfect education 
hitherto in operation, and the extremely imperfect 
method of instruction on all subjects — but espe- 
cially on moral and religious ones — hitherto pur- 
sued at all schools. Words are considered merely 
grammatically as words, and not intellectually and 
morally as the representatives of thoughts, feelings, 
things, and events ; and when the meaning of words 
is required or given, it is from the dictionary, a dry 
formal one — a distinction from other words rather 
than the development of the meaning and bearing 
of the word itself as the representative of things. 
Hence the extent to which men have been deceived 
and misled by the use and abuse of words. Partial 
and party meanings have been attached to them; 
and what were invented and intended originally to 
promote the knowledge of things, have often proved to 
be among the greatest obstacles to knowledge. The 
business of the savage is to invent words to express 
his thoughts, and feelings, and the objects he is 
acquainted with; that of the civilised man, of the 
scholar and man of intellect, is to form clear ideas 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. XXXIX 

of the things which are represented by all the words 
of the language he studies. The child is surrounded 
by and overwhelmed with words. He reads, espe- 
cially in this age of books, words innumerable, whose 
sounds and letters he knows, but not their meanings. 
When questioned upon that subject, he shews the 
few ideas which the words have conveyed. 

Those who first visited the establishment of Fel- 
lenberg saw a great scheme in action of schools, 
workshops, and agriculture; they saw new things 
taught, and old things taught in a new way ; they 
saw schools for all classes, the lowest and the high- 
est, carried on under one superintendence. When 
the establishment was explained to them, they heard 
the reasons of what was done, and the dependence 
of one part upon another. This was the explanation 
they desired, and the one which was obviously de- 
sirable to be given and received. They did not 
require, nor was it possible, that Fellenberg should 
enter into the history of his own mind upon the 
subject, and how far his religious and conscientious 
feelings had operated in urging him to the under- 
taking. They therefore denominated the whole ma- 
chinery a piece of philosophy ; and this ominous 
word was echoed through Europe — particularly 



xl INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

through England — accompanied by all the vague, 
indefinite, and erroneous ideas which modern times 
had attached to it. Philosophy, which originally 
meant the study of wisdom, means specifically, in 
these days, the attempt to discover some rule or 
law under which a number of facts may be ranged, 
or to deduce some maxim of common sense from 
the study of a particular subject, by which our actions 
may be directed and regulated. The English pride 
themselves upon their practical common sense on 
all subjects, and upon their disregard of theory and 
philosophy, as unsuited to practice ; but they forget 
that this is only philosophy under a different name, 
and that the greatest philosopher is he who can best 
adapt general rules and maxims to the practice of 
common life. If we glance at the state of crime — 
at that of pauperism a few years ago — and at the 
general results of education among the middle and 
upper classes, — we shall have no great reason to 
boast of our common sense, or of our wisdom in 
discarding the study of philosophy as applicable to 
the improvement of man. 

It is a great thing to introduce the love of any 
subject or science into the heart ; or to excite, in 
one's self or others, the sentiment of love at all. He 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. xli 

who has it not, has only half a title to humanity ; he 
who has once attained it, has entered into the highest 
class among the beings to which he belongs. For 
this truth we have the surest possible authority — 
that of the Divine Founder of our religion; love 
being made by him the grand test of discipleship. 
This love must be as diffusive as the works of its 
primary and great object, the Maker of all things. 
The sentiment which has once attached itself to him 
must spread over all his works; because wherever 
they are, He is, for they exist only in him. It even 
attaches itself to inanimate and insensible things ; 
it sees " sermons in stones, and good in every thing." 
Much more does it unfold itself towards its own 
kind — towards the image of the Divinity, which is 
stamped upon every human being. A man may be- 
come an earnest politician, or a violent party-man, 
or a philosophical writer upon plausible theories of 
imaginary virtue, without any practical sentiment of 
regard and love for man, or of reverence for his 
Maker ; but no man without that sentiment will en- 
gage in a scheme of benevolence entirely practical, 
which will require years of labour, anxiety, self-sacri- 
fice, and expense, to bring to perfection. It is a com- 
mon proverb, that it is easy to talk, but difficult to 



xlii INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

practise. If Fellenberg had been like other men, he 
would have been satisfied with writing or declaiming 
on these subjects ; but he would not have retired from 
public life, that he might surround himself with objects 
of care and responsibility, and have drawn upon him- 
self the suspicion and ill-will of his countrymen and 
of prejudiced foreigners. 

We must not, however, omit to mention, that 
Fellenberg was preceded in his philanthropic path 
by one celebrated individual, Pestalozzi ; * whose 
sensitive nature, shocked at the vice and brutality of 
the lowest class of society about him — filled with pity 
for the deserted and destitute state of the children 
— and deeply penetrated with the utter inefficiency 
of all the common methods of training them up to 
Christian virtue, — determined to try what methods 
entirely new might accomplish in saving them from 
destruction, vice, and infamy, and forming them to 
industry and religion. He simply assumed these 
principles — that children are created with minds, 
feelings, affections, a moral instinct, and an under- 

* It should not be forgotten that Pestalozzi himself had 
been preceded by Rochow, Basedow, Campe, and Saltzmann ; 
to each of whom education owes some improvement. 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. xltii 

standing ; that mere memory is one of the lowest 
of the faculties ; that learning by rote, without the 
participation of the understanding, is not only use- 
less and disgusting, but positively injurious, since it 
tends to weaken, and may even pervert, the judg- 
ment ; that the exercise of the affections and under- 
standing in a natural way must be agreeable and 
interesting to children ; and that both nature and 
revelation must be delightful to the human soul, if 
presented to it in a proper manner. The problem 
to be solved was, How is this method to be dis- 
covered? Pestalozzi discarded at once the usual 
primary step of the alphabet and of spelling, and 
deferred them till a certain portion of knowledge 
had been acquired by oral instruction. Instead of 
letters, he presented to the children things them- 
selves, and explained to them their nature and uses ; 
their qualities, as perceived by the different senses ; 
their uses in the common concerns of life ; their na- 
tural history ; how they were produced in nature ; 
and what changes they underwent before they be- 
came applicable to different uses. In all this, the 
understanding preceded the memory ; and the child- 
ren were found to be born with a relish for knowledge 
which had never been suspected, and with an innate 



Xliv INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

ability for acquiring it which had been thought to 
be the result only of a long and refined education. 
In like manner, instead of giving them moral pre- 
cepts to commit to memory, he drew out their moral 
feelings by suitable questions, and by supposed cases 
of life and manners ; by bringing before their ima- 
gination scenes of domestic life, family affection, 
good and bad conduct ; and by applying the ideas, 
feelings, and principles, thus drawn forth, to their 
own behaviour one among another. When he had 
in this manner informed and enlightened the con- 
science and moral judgment, he brought his instruc- 
tion to the test of Scripture, which he illustrated 
and enforced, and then impressed upon them as the 
highest moral authority, and one to which their 
whole nature should be subject. He next opened 
to them, after having thus prepared the way, the 
spirituality of their own nature, and the eternal 
improvement for which it had been created. He 
then returned to the first and simple principles 
from which he set out, and shewed how the ex- 
ercise of the senses, and the knowledge obtained 
by them, were the first links in the chain of divine 
benevolence and wisdom, by which the young were 
both to lay hold of wisdom and happiness them- 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. xlv 

selves, and to glorify Him who made and upheld 
them. 

Pestalozzi could not fully explain his views of 
education or of human nature : he was surrounded 
with difficulties ; those views were extensive, embra- 
cing man in all his faculties, feelings, and affections ; 
in all his stages of childhood, youth, and maturity ; 
in all his relations of child and parent, servant or 
master, subject or ruler ; and as a religious being, 
looking forward to a responsible eternity. No man 
can appreciate education who does not view it in its 
whole extent. It is the contracted view of it, of 
which we have spoken before, that causes it to be 
misunderstood and undervalued. But to carry his 
plans into effect, Pestalozzi required time — the same 
individuals to be under his management during the 
whole period of education, till they should be old 
enough to enter upon active life : he required the 
means of maintaining his establishment, and teachers 
to assist imbued with his own views, and practically 
capable of acting upon them. Then he had to 
contend against the prejudices and self-interest of 
people about him — of the parents — of the Church 
to which he belonged — and of the public function- 
aries of the state— who were all jealous of new ideas, 



Xlvi INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

whatever they might be, and who feared that, however 
corrupted and vicious the people were, every attempt 
to improve them would only make them worse. Pes- 
talozzi had neither the funds to support his estab- 
lishment, nor health, strength, and calmness, to con- 
tend against the opposition he met with from those 
who misapprehended his views, or envied him the 
chance of success, or opposed him for mere party 
purposes. Thus, this great friend of humanity and 
practical religion became a martyr to the grand 
cause for which man was created and redeemed — 
the cause of moral regeneration and of the practical 
influence of the Gospel. 

But Pestalozzi had not lived in vain. Though 
some of his pupils had repaid his kindness and con- 
fidence with base ingratitude, others had caught a 
ray of his spirit, and contributed to spread its light 
through Europe by various publications. No real 
friend of man should ever be disheartened at the 
slowness with which his good suggestions are under- 
stood and received by the world, nor at the obloquy 
through which they have to pass on their road to 
adoption. If a man can sow but " one grain of mus- 
tard-seed" during this his mortal pilgrimage, he may 
lay his head in peace upon the pillow of death, satis- 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. xlvii 

fied that he has not lived in vain. We cannot but 
believe that there is an especial providence over the 
hearts and lives of the moral improvers of mankind. 
" Every good gift and every perfect gift is from 
above, and cometh down from the Father of lights." 
Society could not hold on its progressive course 
without continual accessions of light and know- 
ledge, exhibited and conveyed through the agencies 
of the zealous and disinterested lovers of their kind. 
These necessary and invaluable gifts are all rays 
from Divine wisdom. It is our business to study 
and profit by them, and to observe in them the 
general rule or law with which they are connected, 
in order to work with them for the improvement of 
man. 

When Fellenberg, therefore, began to direct his 
mind to the formation of moral and religious cha- 
racter in youth, as the preventive remedy for vice 
and crime, and as the necessary steps, humanly 
speaking, of elevating the heart to Christian prin- 
ciples, he had the advantage of the experience of 
Pestalozzi, and of other less eminent men, which 
materially smoothed down the first difficulties of his 
path. It had been proved that children might be 
taken from the most abandoned parents, and after 



Xlviii INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

being for a certain time brought under the steady, 
judicious, and kind discipline of Pestalozzi, would 
become tractable, orderly, and industrious. Vice 
seemed to disappear spontaneously, and good con- 
duct to take its place. Idleness ceased to possess 
charms ; regular labour and mental cultivation be- 
came happiness. A spirit of Christian affection and 
Christian duty grew up among the pupils, and reli- 
gious principles became motives of conduct. 

Before Fellenberg began to act upon his views, 
he had arrived at the conclusion, that the only solid 
basis of human character was religion ; but as man 
is compelled to work by means (and, indeed, means 
form also the mode of development of the Divine 
wisdom and power), he had to look to means for 
the attainment of his object — to contrive the various 
employments and mental tasks, and the whole system 
of management, which must pervade his establish- 
ment. Superficial observers imagined, when they 
beheld all this apparatus, that what was obvious 
to the senses constituted the whole of Fellenberg's 
ideas : because they did not see the soul of the ma- 
chine, they concluded there was none ; and because 
Fellenberg was not constantly sermonising his pupils 
— though religion was on all suitable occasions directly 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. xlix 

inculcated — they doubted his religious motives. No 
conclusion could be more illogical. Fellenberg ought 
to be allowed the same privilege which is enjoyed by 
all superintendents of a large and complicated plan. 
While examining it in detail, we are apt to forget 
one point in considering another; we are apt to 
overrate the relative importance of parts while in- 
specting them ; we may differ in our opinion of the 
subordinate arrangements ; we may make many mis- 
takes from our own incompetence to judge ; we may 
forget, in our objections, the capability of improve- 
ment which belongs to all human plans ; and we may 
not see the difficulties with which the subject has to 
contend. 



FELLENBERG'S VIEWS. 



FELLENBERG'S VIEWS. 



In the preceding remarks we have taken a view 
of the history of education and society in Europe, 
according to the impressions which reading and re- 
flection have made upon ourselves. We have at 
the same time faithfully described the effect which 
the revolutionary spirit of the age had upon the 
mind of Fellenberg in his younger days, and the 
practical conclusions which he drew from it with 
respect to the necessity of an education of a totally 
different kind from any which previously prevailed 
in Europe, embracing in its operations every class 
of society in its peculiar wants, and extending to 
the whole nature of man, physical, moral, and intel- 
lectual. 

In the following chapter we shall permit him to 
speak for himself : we shall collect his own expres- 
sions and trains of thought, as put forth on different 
occasions, as far as difference of languages will enable 
us to do so. We shall merely give them a unity and 
arrangement which they do not possess in the ori- 
ginal, in consequence of their having been written 
at different times, and addressed to different persons, 
sometimes orally, sometimes in writing. The words 

B 



2 fellenberg's views. 

of the original we shall generally preserve, and its 
spirit always. 

We establish our institutions (says Fellenberg) 
upon the basis of Christianity; we begin our la- 
bours with the Gospel ; we proceed upon its prin- 
ciples and conditions. Every sound system of edu- 
cation must begin and end with the instructions 
and lessons of Jesus Christ ; it must rest on him and 
his doctrines, motives, rules, and principles. As his 
motives are the only ones upon which human cha- 
racter can be properly formed, so his revelations of 
its ultimate destiny and prospects are the only object 
of moral perfection to which it can be worthily 
directed ; and the Divine assistance he has revealed 
and promised is the grand co-operation, without 
which it would be vain to indulge any hope of suc- 
cess. In the instructions of Jesus Christ is to be 
found the substance of the theory of education — the 
best practical example for the educator to follow ; 
and in the result we should aim at no other object 
than the realisation of the kingdom of God upon 
earth, to which he has directed mankind. 

The great traits of the character of Christ may 
at the commencement seem to our pupils like the 
first dawning of the rays of the morning, which are 
scattered and almost lost in the clearness of an un- 
clouded horizon. The mind of the child is far from 
being able to comprehend the divine love of Christ, 
embracing all mankind with inexhaustible and pro- 



fellenberg's views. 3 

found sympathy ; or his unbounded love for our 
race, and his intense labours and sufferings as a 
proof of his love. We cannot at first follow out 
this grand picture in all its details ; we must be- 
gin with its principal features, and allow them 
to sink into the mind, to take root, to be well and 
familiarly pondered over; to become incorporated 
with the mind, and to appear natural to it and a 
part of itself, before we proceed to fill up the out- 
line. We must wait till the mind opens more and 
more — till its faculties of judgment and reason, as 
well as its feelings, are developed. This advance of 
the mind must be watched, and fed as it proceeds 
and is able to bear stronger food. The system of 
Jesus Christ, though adapted to persons of all ages 
in its different departments, is yet to be worthily 
comprehended only by adult minds, and by those 
who have given all their energies to its cultivation : 
it is so comprehensive and sublime, that we may go 
farther, and say that every generation will find new 
views and prospects in it, as their own minds and in- 
tellects are more and more expanded and filled with 
all divine and natural knowledge. The essential 
points will not alter ; but new beauties will come 
into sight, and an effulgence unknown to former 
times will burst upon the eye. We are none of us 
competent at present to understand all the mysteries 
of Christ : to us and to our children do they belong ; 
and they will be revealed to those who come after 
us, in proportion to the fitness of their hearts and 



4 FELLENBERG S VIEWS. 

minds to receive them. These things we must 
remember in the instruction of children. This in- 
struction is to be carried through a long succession 
of years ; from the cradle to manhood ; from the 
age of three or four, when they first begin to lisp 
their hymns and letters, through the period of child- 
hood, up to that period when they can understand 
the reasonableness of the rule, " to whom much is 
given, from him much will be required : " and the 
prudence of the maxim, " keep your loins girded, 
and your lamps burning:" and the justice of the 
award, " thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good 
things, and likewise Lazarus evil things ; but now 
he is comforted, and thou art tormented : " and the 
awful truth and principle of human conduct, " if 
they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will 
they be persuaded though one rose from the dead." 
It is evident that these truths form a gradative 
system, adapted to the different ages of life ; that 
they must be taught ; and not merely taught by 
rote, but by feeling and conviction, to the opening, 
the growing, and the mature mind. What is suit- 
able for the man is not suited to the youth ; what 
is intelligible to the youth is not so to the child ; 
but if the child has not been taught to feel and to 
believe the truth of the pathetic histories of the 
Bible during his age of young and vivid feeling, 
and to sympathise with all the good, and against all 
the evil, of which he hears from a loved parent's 
lips, he will never give a moral attention to, nor feel 



FELLENBERG S VIEWS. 5 

a moral interest in, the higher principles which will 
afterwards be displayed to him ; nor discover a moral 
taste for truth as truth, when his mind is old enough 
and strong enough to appreciate the profoundness 
and importance of that question, "What is truth?"* 
Christ then, as a model, is to be continually held 
up by the educator to the eye of his pupils, from 
the junior to the senior class, as the bright ex- 
emplar and illustrator of human conduct, both in 
civil and religious matters, till at last they are able 
to receive him religiously as their head and Saviour, 
and the great head of the spiritual world. When 
they are able to attain to this view, the business of 
the educator may in a manner be said to cease, and 
to be handed on to the minister of religion. The 
two offices are in a degree blended together, and 
yet distinct ; and it is a matter of delicacy and re- 
finement to draw the line between them, For this 
purpose, the aid of the minister must be sought, 
and his specific place assigned in the business of 
education. 

Never could the sublime morality of Revelation, 
and the exalted character of Christ, be better pre- 
sented to the imitation and adoration of our race, 
than at this moment. Never could his example in 
instructing the ignorant, directing the wandering, 
and in delivering the world from moral evil, be more 
strongly recommended to the true philanthropist, 

* See Note A at the end of the volume. 



6 FELLENBERGS VIEWS. 

who may lay claim to the high office of being his 
true disciple. Our own age, like others, has its 
moral evils to encounter ; those of a corrupt and 
selfish heart, of a proud and conceited scepticism, 
of dangerous theories and innovations, and of awful 
and sweeping revolutions. The human mind has 
received a wondrous intellectual enlightenment, 
mighty for good or for evil, with which our edu- 
cators have not kept pace in their moral training. 
A new race of educators is demanded, who shall 
base all their classical and natural knowledge upon 
that rock alone where the waves of moral ruin can- 
not reach it, — the Rock of Ages, the Rock of Reve- 
lation, as a system of practical morals, upon the 
rock of Christ and of God. The study of the 
classics, of Greek and Roman history, will encircle 
the mind with subjects for comparison and illustra- 
tion. Mixed up with an absurd and dangerous my- 
thology, they contain models of pure composition 
and style, with profound remarks upon the prin- 
ciples of human nature, as they appeared to men of 
acute minds, who were unaided by the indispensable 
light of Revelation for a correct understanding of 
our nature : but at every step the pupil requires to 
have their beauties and errors carefully separated 
and pointed out, and their morality strongly con- 
trasted with the only true standard — that of the 
Gospel. He may then perceive the infinite supe- 
riority of Christianity over the superstitions of the 
ancients, and the philosophy of their wisest men. 



FELLENBERG S VIEWS. 7 

He will see the necessity of a Revelation for the 
moral wants and security of mankind, and be pre- 
pared for a full and complete course of Scripture 
history, so as to have a clear view of the most beau- 
tiful and harmonious of all subjects of contempla- 
tion — the rise, progress, and completion of God's 
miraculous dealings with men ; the small and im- 
perceptible beginnings by which he made himself 
known to Abraham, and convinced him, in an ido- 
latrous age, that there was a God who made and 
governed the world, and would one day judge it ; 
the more public and awful proofs which he gave of 
his government in the history of Moses ; the race 
of prophets which he raised up, whose sublime com- 
positions extinguish, in their superior blaze, even 
the idolised productions of Greece and Rome ; the 
retributive history of the destinies of the Jews, as 
interwoven with that of other nations, — their pro- 
sperous virtues, their ruinous crimes ; and lastly, the 
consummation of all, in the indescribable simplicity 
and sublimity of the religion of Christ— the poorest, 
meanest, humblest of mankind, and yet the most 
affectionate, pathetic, and profound of all ; the ser- 
vant of all, and yet the king and ruler of all ; cut 
off in the flower of his youth, only to live for ever, 
both in the heaven of heavens and in the hearts and 
lives of men to the latest generations ; and more 
near to each generation in proportion as it is more 
remote from the period of his death, because each 
generation, by its moral improvement, is more ca- 



8 fellenberg's views. 

pable of receiving and appreciating the character 
of Jesus Christ, and, to use a strong figurative ex- 
pression, of receiving him into their hearts ; and 
because it is nearer to the day of his second coming 
to judge and to save. 

This scheme, and system, and history of Revela- 
tion, leads at once to a practical result. It sets 
aside in an instant all inferior motives and rules in 
morals ; it enters into no calculations even of the 
utility and advantage of virtue ; it lays no schemes 
for attracting the applause of the world, or for se- 
curing a niche in the temple of Fame ; its maxim is 
simple, persuasive, and overpowering, viz. " to do 
the will of God from the heart," and thus to " know 
that the doctrine is of God." Its most convincing 
argument is a life of purity ; the weakness of man, 
the power of God. A pagan moralist imagines he 
can do all things, and ends by doing nothing, — he 
cannot even conquer himself; the Christian mo- 
ralist, diffident of his own power to keep the least 
portion of the law, ends by keeping all in the power 
of another. 

Thus, the best preparation for understanding 
and valuing the Christian revelation is to implant 
its spirit in the heart of the pupil, and to accustom 
him to act it out in his daily avocations, studies, 
and pursuits. Precept alone is meagre, dull, and 
dead ; it is what is called " mere morality." The 
child must be accustomed to the exercise of bene- 
volent feelings as a daily occupation, before he can 



FELLENBERG S VIEWS. V 

understand the assurance that " it is more blessed 
to give than to receive ;" he must make many un- 
successful efforts to walk steadily in the course of 
duty and prudence, before he can be convinced of 
his need of Divine aid and guidance, or before he 
can understand and feel the command, " If any man 
lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth libe- 
rally, and upbraideth not." The young pupil must 
never be allowed to consider religion and religious 
sentiments as things distinct and separate from his 
ordinary life ; instruction and practice, theory and 
action, must go hand in hand together. This habit 
must begin to be formed from the commencement ; 
the pupil must be accustomed, with conscientious 
care, in every part of his intercourse with others, 
" to do unto others as he would they should do unto 
him," even in the most minute details of action and 
self-restraint; otherwise he will not be able, at any 
future period, to regulate his conduct by this fun- 
damental rule without the greatest difficulty. From 
this early neglect of practice, and resting in the in- 
culcation of mere precept, arise the constant imper- 
fections which we see in the conduct of persons 
anxious to do what is right ; and of which none are 
more sensible than they themselves, when they have 
once begun to study their own heart, and to act 
upon the profound, though pagan principle, " Know 
thyself." 

This view of religion is the principle, rule, and 
practice of our establishment ; but in addition to 



10 fellenberg's views. 

this, in order to do full justice to the pupil and the 
subject, and to give a sanction to its paramount im- 
portance, each pupil is placed under the especial 
care of a minister of religion, chosen or approved 
of by his parents, whose duty it is to instruct him, 
more deeply than school-exercises allow of, in the 
essential doctrines of Christianity. Thus, he is in- 
structed in the faith of his parents and family, with 
as much care and earnestness as if he were under 
the domestic roof, while he is led, by the peculiar 
discipline of the school, to carry out the preceptive 
part into daily action and practical habits ; at least, 
this, if not fully effected, is the aim and scope of 
the whole system. 

The summary of this part of the education is 
therefore the following : — the whole of the Scripture 
history read, with portions committed to memory ; 
selected books and divisions read critically, and 
committed to memory ; a summary of Christian 
doctrines and duties, expressed as much as possible 
in Scripture language. In the upper classes, a more 
enlarged compendium of the same ; a course of what 
is called natural religion and morals, according to 
the views which we are now enabled to take of them 
from the light of Revelation ; the study of the Greek 
Testament ; and finally, a concise and general ac- 
count of ecclesiastical history. The religious ser- 
vices of the Sunday are intended both for devotion 
and instruction ; and two lessons in the week are 
especially devoted to an account of the instructions 



fellenberg's views. 11 

of the preceding Sunday, in which explanations 
are given of any thing which was imperfectly under- 
stood. 

It need not be said, that great difficulties some- 
times ^rise on this subject with new pupils. They 
come at all ages, and from all kinds of previous 
training and instruction. Many have been sent 
hither as a last resource, when the character had 
been neglected or contaminated. Great considera- 
tion is requisite whether they can be received with- 
out danger to the other pupils ; and if received, in 
what way their minds and dispositions may most 
judiciously be drawn into the studies of the place ; 
how their barren thoughts may be fertilised, and 
their habits of indolence and self-indulgence ex- 
changed for those of active duty and application. 
They are treated with great tenderness and con- 
sideration, as persons whose previous circumstances 
require pity and sympathy ; they are made to under- 
stand the system and objects of the place, before a 
regular routine of study and employment is required 
of them ; their better feelings, their ideas of pro- 
priety, and their good sense, are appealed to, in order 
to carry conviction to their hearts of the friendly and 
beneficial intentions and tendency of things around 
them. If these representations are found insuffi- 
cient, after a certain period, to solicit their appro- 
bation and concurrence, and their previous habits 
appear irradicable, it seems wiser to allow them to 
return to their friends, than to prolong a useless and 



12 fellenberg's views. 

dangerous contest. But generally, the happiest con- 
sequences result from this considerate mode of pre- 
senting the subject. It is that which the divine 
Author of Christianity himself proposes for our 
model and imitation. Considering the almighty 
power which he wielded, it is wonderful how little 
recourse he had to threatenings, and how unceas- 
ingly he urged the language of persuasion ; " Come 
unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden ; 
take my yoke upon you, for I am meek and lowly 
of heart ; and ye shall find rest." When he fore- 
saw the calamitous fate of Jerusalem, though he 
knew he had to pass through the most bitter agonies 
from the cruelty of the people, yet, instead of any 
degree of satisfaction at the retaliation they were 
to undergo from the arm of another, he wept over 
their miseries, occasioned by their obstinacy and 
crimes. Such must be the general spirit of every 
system which would reform, establish, and perfect 
the human heart. Severity may occasionally be 
necessary, especially in those systems of which it is 
the principal feature, and in those schools which, 
like an army, can only be held together by corporal 
punishment ; but in a system which lays any claim 
to the title of Christian, mild appeals to good feeling 
and good sense must form the rule of government, 
and severity must be the exception. We are of 
opinion that the present low state of morals in 
countries professing so pure, refined, and holy a 
religion as that of Christianity, is chiefly owing tp 



CONSCIENCE AND MORALS. 13 

the neglect of these grand principles of the Gospel 
in the education of youth ; to their not being made 
the principal object in education; to their being 
postponed to the cultivation of mere intellect, with- 
out any mixture, or with very little mixture, of the 
heart and affections ; the latter being made the ex- 
ception rather than the rule. Perhaps we are to 
consider this fact as a proof that the minds of men 
are still very far removed from the spirit of the 
Gospel, notwithstanding the length of time during 
which religious establishments have existed, and the 
myriads of religious volumes which have been writ- 
ten. But to return : it is therefore the object of 
this establishment to build up education upon the 
Gospel — upon practical Christianity ; to form from 
this the spirit of the school, of the teachers, and of 
the pupils ; to consider the cultivation of the intel- 
lect as secondary and subordinate, and as springing 
out of the other as its root. 

CONSCIENCE AND MORALS. 
Having fixed upon the Bible as our basis of 
action — as the only basis of all human action — we 
have next to consider what man himself is, and in 
what way the educator, as far as human means are 
concerned, must proceed to draw out the feelings 
and faculties of the pupil towards the principles of 
the Bible, and to instil its spirit into his heart, so 
as to make it the motive and safeguard of his con- 
duct. It is evident that to make the Bible useful, we 



14 CONSCIENCE AND MORALS. 

must consider the nature of the being to whom it is 
addressed. Unless he had a nature corresponding to 
the instructions of the Bible, it would be perfectly 
useless to him. The Author of the one is also the 
Author of the other, and has made the two to answer 
to each other. We must therefore seek for the ap- 
plication of the one in the nature, principles, and 
constitution of the other. These must be studied 
as well as the book, if we would know how to apply 
the wisdom of the book, and to make it efficacious. 
We must assume that, as man is addressed as a re- 
sponsible and rational being, he possesses a moral 
nature, a conscience, and an understanding : he pos- 
sesses a will in common only with other animals ; 
but he possesses distinctively, as man, a conscience, 
and an intelligent, reasoning mind. These two prin- 
ciples must always be kept in view by the educator. 
The will, which constitutes the final point upon 
which character turns, is assailed by an infinity 
of motives, which urge it to decide and to yield 
itself to their influence ; whilst conscience and rea- 
son stand by, as it were, in awful suspense, to deliver 
in their verdict when the irrevocable step is made. 
How are these motives to be presented or controlled 
by the educator, so as to lead and fix the will to 
prefer what is good, noble, and Christian, to what is 
evil, low, animal, and ruinous ? 

The religious feelings are bound up with our 
very first impressions, if properly managed. The 
first conceptions and impressions of the infant are 



CONSCIENCE AND MORALS. 15 

derived from the countenances and actions of those 
around him. The office and look of maternal love, 
and tenderness of maternal affection, open heaven 
to the child, through the medium of the heart of 
the mother. The maternal care which watches and 
labours for the good of the child with the warmest 
affection, the most anxious foresight, and the most 
unwearied efforts, without expecting any other re- 
ward than the delight of contributing to his welfare 
— which sees and provides for all that his mind can 
grasp — should give the child his first conceptions of 
the all-wise, all-good, and all-powerful God. Our 
first ideas of the character of the Deity, and of his 
infinite perfections, are derived from the manners, 
conduct, and affections of those around us, by sepa- 
rating the more perfect from the less perfect, and 
by compounding the former together into a simple 
whole. Therefore, if nothing which is good and 
amiable is exhibited to us by our first instructors, 
we can form no conception of a superior Being, who 
is all goodness and benevolence. There will be 
many drawbacks in the mind of the child, owing 
to the many imperfections of those about him, even 
in the best of characters ; but if no virtues, or 
scarcely any, are presented to him — if the sur- 
rounding characters are vicious and inconsistent 
— the child will have no good position to start 
from, no rock to build upon ; his experience will 
be a struggle amid conflicting experience and prin- 
ciples ; he will hear and see occasionally what is 



16 CONSCIENCE AND MORALS. 

right, and he will find an echo to this in his own 
breast ; but he will see much more which is wrong, 
which contradicts the former, and will find in him- 
self desires and motives at war with his other prin- 
ciples, without any overruling standard to refer to 
for decision. Thus good and evil hold a balance 
before him, in which the evil side predominates 
and the mind, wanting a decided preponderance 
and permanent ascendancy of right, is thrown upon 
its immediate gratifications, which are all of a 
selfish nature, according to the first law of a sen- 
tient being, which must be its own preservation and 
immediate enjoyment. 

In our situation as educators and teachers, the 
most sacred duties of parents devolve upon us ; we 
should therefore seek to present to our pupils the 
same disinterested, benevolent, unvarying, and con- 
sistent care, which they would receive from devoted 
and conscientious parents, with hearts willing to do 
their duty, and minds capable of doing it, in order 
that they may draw from us their first ideas of the 
Divine attributes and providence. In this view, our 
office becomes one of the most high and holy ones 
which men are capable of discharging, as the pupils 
have to receive from us the great principles of 
right and wrong, of a useful or pernicious life, of 
happiness or misery, of weal or woe, for time and 
eternity. Let no one think that our arrangements 
for this high purpose are too complicated and 
careful, too minute, too scrupulous, embracing too 



CULTIVATION OF THE CONSCIENCE. 17 

many objects of pursuit, study, or employment. We 
have the whole character to form, from childhood 
to manhood, and from the cottage to the palace, 
since we embrace in our system the education of 
every rank in the community. Without attempting 
to enfeeble with words what cannot be fully ex- 
pressed, we must observe, that every appearance of 
nature which exhibits the wisdom, goodness, and 
power of the Creator, with the aid of a faithful con- 
ducting hand, will bring the child continually nearer 
to the invisible Creator, Preserver, and Benefactor, 
and lead him gradually to perceive his delightful 
and glorious relation to the Most High, — 

To look through nature up to nature's God. 

For as the Bible is the will of God expressed in 
words, nature is his will expressed in actions. 

Favourable moments should be seized, without 
forcing the attention of the child from the subject 
before him, to lead him to reflect on the superiority 
of the works of nature, considered as those of God, 
over all the works of man, in their beauty and per- 
fection, and in their display of skill and wisdom ; 
and especially in the powers by which the physical 
changes of nature are carried on, so totally unlike 
and superior to any power which man has hitherto 
been able to employ. The utmost power which 
man can employ is mechanical, and that belonging 
to the lower standard of mechanism ; for its higher 
standards, as electricity, he has been unable to wield, 
c 



18 CULTIVATION OF THE CONSCIENCE. 

for his own purposes, to any great extent. Besides 
these, nature employs as a superaddition a variety 
of vital energies, far beyond the control and con- 
ception of man, giving rise at once to the idea of a 
spiritual Cause, whose powers and resources are 
peculiar, distinctive, and incomprehensible. Thus 
the mind, properly led to observe and comment upon 
these interesting and extraordinary facts, is daily 
filling itself with the idea of Divine power, as shewn 
in his works, made visible and tangible at first, as 
if for the purpose of mathematical demonstration, 
but spiritualised by the studious and devout mind 
into an essence invisible and untangible like itself, 
and capable of making all things out of nothing. 

Conscience is at first only a principle, having 
different degrees of original strength in different 
individuals, but capable in all persons of education 
and expansion, and of taking cognizance of all the 
actions and thoughts of the heart. It must be spe- 
cifically cultivated, in order to be improved and 
developed. Most systems of education pay strenuous 
attention to the cultivation of the memory from the 
very cradle, as if they thought that all excellence 
were numerical, and consisted in the mere number 
of ideas, without regard to their nature or their 
relations and combinations; and by these means 
pupils may be brought to learn by heart with rapid 
facility many hundreds of words, without attaching 
any meaning to them. If we wish the conscience to 
be perfected, we must cultivate it with the same 



CULTIVATION OF THE CONSCIENCE. 19 

assiduity. We must first awaken it, and enable it to 
feel its own power. We must exercise it by constant 
appeals to it under all the circumstances which 
arise through the day. As there are no actions 
which do not bear directly or indirectly upon 
morals and conscience, so we must be constantly 
pointing out this relation. Conscience puts us im- 
mediately in connexion with the Deity himself. 
It is the principle in our constitution which enables 
us to feel his character as a moral Governor : 
mere reason would not do that. It requires a 
moral nature in us; and that moral nature is ex- 
pressed in one word, Conscience, or in Scripture 
language, the Heart. But not only all the actions 
of the day afford occasions for an appeal to the 
conscience and the exercise of its peculiar powers, 
but the greater part of the reading of schools, which 
consists of history, poetry, and didactic works, affords 
the same ; in them we exercise the conscience 
freely and without bias on the actions of others, 
and thus form it to a right tone of feeling and judg- 
ment. Thus there are two moral worlds, the inner 
one and the outer one, which, when properly taken 
advantage of, give as ample a scope for the culti- 
vation of the powers of conscience, as the various 
books which are studied in schools do for the cul- 
tivation of the memory ; and all this exercise ought 
to be so conducted as to lead us up to God himself 
as the superintendent and guardian and judge of 
conscience. It is something to have been created a 



20 CULTIVATION OF THE CONSCIENCE. 

being possessing this faculty ; but the mere pos- 
session of it sinks into insignificance when compared 
with the sublime and all-important truth, that God 
is the guardian of it, and of its rights and respon- 
sibilities. The most unnatural thing a man could 
do, if he were responsible to none but himself, would 
be to act against his conscience ; but now, having 
Qod for its guardian, it is also the most dangerous 
thing he can do, for upon it, and upon it alone, 
depends his eternal happiness or misery. It is 
therefore of the utmost consequence to begin early 
in life, even from the cradle, to awaken, call forth, 
and exercise this faculty — to obey its dictates as 
the paramount rule of life — to observe with won- 
der and adoration the infinitely kind, wise, and 
powerful hand, which, while it leaves the will free 
and responsible, yet teaches, instructs, and warns 
us, by the various events of life, to cherish and 
obey conscience, and through that to attain to the 
highest and purest joys of which our nature is 
susceptible. 

The nature of right and wrong, the beauty of 
the one, the hatefulness of the other, can never be 
learned by a child as abstract truths. Without the 
relations of man with man, the moral law not only 
has no application, but cannot even be fully com- 
prehended. We become accessible to the voice of 
the law which regulates our intercourse with our 
fellow-men only so far as they appear before us. 
They may be presented to us either in the com- 



CULTIVATION OF THE CONSCIENCE. 21 

merce of life, or by means of historical and bio- 
graphical descriptions. Without such points of 
comparison, we have no means of forming a just 
estimate of individual character ; and it is not until 
we have observed and considered the actions and 
characters of many of the most noble and excellent 
men, that we are capable of forming any thing like 
a just estimate of the resplendent moral glory of 
the Saviour. 

The world of little children in which the pupil 
lives and acts is the first, the most natural field for 
his observation. Intercourse with those of his own 
age is more useful for the excitement and develop- 
ment of his mind, than with adults. The continual 
watchfulness which should observe all their move- 
ments will discover constant opportunities to pre- 
sent living examples of abstract truths. Every 
occasion of this kind should be taken advantage 
of, and the child should be thus taught to refer his 
actions, and those of his companions, to a superior 
law or rule, and to understand the meaning and 
importance of the law by a continual application of 
it to his conduct. 



REMARKS 

ON THE PRECEDING ACCOUNT OF 

FELLENBERG'S 
RELIGIOUS AND MORAL VIEWS. 



The preceding observations on the subject of reli- 
gion and revelation are made, as we have said, as 
much as possible in the words of Fellenberg. We 
have attempted to give a faithful transcript of the 
mind, feelings, and object of the author, in order 
that his views and labours may be fairly and fully 
appreciated. The more these are examined and 
understood, the more highly must this venerable 
character rise in our estimation, and the more im- 
portant must his labours appear to the welfare of 
society at large, because of the practical nature of 
his institution. He has devoted his life and fortune 
to the attempt to bring down religion from heaven 
to dwell among men, to adapt the theories of religion 
to common life, and to embody during the week- 
days those truths which are spiritualised on the Sab- 
bath. All this was in the mind of Fellenberg half 
a century ago. At a time when the learned and 
refined world of Europe considered revelation as 



PRACTICAL DETAILS. 23 

at best but a beautiful fable, Fellenberg both felt 
and acknowledged its truth, and conceived the illus- 
trious idea of forming a practical system of educa- 
tion for all ranks, based upon the reception of its 
precepts and the authority of its laws. He did this 
both theoretically and practically : theoretically, as 
considering revelation to be a message from the 
Almighty of incalculable importance ; and practi- 
cally, as considering an improved system of moral 
and Christian education to be the only remedy for 
human vice, depravity, and revolutionary fury ; as 
well as the only preventative of the future repeti- 
tion of those awful scenes which were then acting 
in Europe, desolating her fairest provinces, and 
sweeping whole classes of society, of the highest 
order, from the face of the earth. 

We have now further to consider and to detail 
the various means by which he proposed to carry 
these ideas into effect. 

PRACTICAL DETAILS. 

Fellenberg purchased about two hundred 
acres of land, of which fifty were arable, for the 
scene of his experiments. His views comprehended 
the improvement of the agriculture of his country, 
as well as that of the character of the inhabitants. 
He intended to make the cultivation of his own 
estate the model by which others might learn how 
to improve theirs. The improvement was to con- 
sist in drainage and irrigation ; in manuring and 



24 MORAL USE OF LABOUR. 

mixing soils ; in the rotation of crops, and in intro- 
ducing new plants for cultivation ; in the perfection 
of old instruments of agriculture, and the invention 
of new ones. He had a passionate fondness for 
agriculture, aiid great ingenuity, invention, and 
skill in the mechanical arts. He therefore esta- 
blished workshops upon the estate, in which all 
the implements of husbandry for his own use, and 
for general sale, were fabricated ; including also a 
department for making and preserving models of 
all machines in use, or which it was proposed to 
bring into use at any future time. The plan em- 
braced a better arrangement and construction of 
the farming buildings, and an improved method of 
managing the cattle. All, in fact, that had been 
done in England during the last half century, for 
the general improvement of agriculture, by various 
societies, was aimed at by Eellenberg by himself alone, 
in reference to the capabilities of his own estate and 
country. But Fellenberg's views and principles led 
him to perceive what in England had not been 
thought of — the bearing which the pursuits of 
agriculture might have upon the morals of man- 
kind. Daily labour in the open air is the most 
healthy of all occupations, both to the body and 
mind. Children who are brought up in the country 
acquire, under ordinary circumstances, a hardy con- 
stitution, which is denied to the children of towns. 
Perceiving that labour might be regulated and mo- 
dified so as to become a system of moral instruction, 



TRAINING DESTITUTE CHILDREN. 25 

as well as one of industrial employment, Fellenberg 
determined to convert a portion of his estate to this 
purpose, and to make an agricultural school his first 
step towards the moral training of children, and the 
improvement of their character. Peculiar as were 
his ideas as to the proper methods to be pursued, 
he could derive no assistance from others in the 
commencement ; nor could he collect together a 
sufficient number of children from their parents 
who might be induced to remain with him long 
enough to give his plans a fair trial. His first 
school, therefore, was formed of the destitute or 
abandoned children of the neighbourhood, partly, 
no doubt, from necessity ; for, till confidence in his 
views had been established, no others were to be 
had. But Fellenberg was prompted in this by other 
motives also ; by a deep and religious conviction 
that the Deity had, in the energetic language of the 
apostle, originally made " all men of one common 
blood ; " that the lowest, as well as the highest, are 
born with the same susceptibilities ; that the vices, 
therefore, into which the lowest ranks sink, are 
engrafted by their position, and the neglect of their 
superiors, and might be prevented by early care, or 
obviated by better culture. The feelings of society, 
he found, were against these conclusions ; and he 
felt the obligation of a Christian pressing upon his 
conscience to remove such debasing and unfounded 
prejudices. To rescue the poor from their moral 
degradation thenceforth governed all his views. He 



26 AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 

considered that the destitute children whom he ,>: 
might collect, and who commonly became the M* 
pests of the community, and the objects against V* 
whom the penal laws were generally directed, 
would prove at once a test of the truth of his 
own principles of education, and of the real causes 
of the degradation of their character. His agricul- 
tural school was therefore his first essay in edu- 
cation. 

AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 

The success of a school of this kind depends 
entirely upon the master, who must be not merely 
the teacher of reading and writing, but the com- 
panion, friend, guide, and parent of the pupils : he 
must never quit them, by night nor by day ; he 
must take his meals with them, labour with them, 
rest with them, explain every thing to them, instruct 
them, play with them, and sleep in the same chamber. 
Without such a master, whom the children can love, 
because he is kind and amiable, — reverence, because 
he is of a certain age and character, — and respect, 
because he possesses a fund of knowledge and infor- 
mation useful to them on all occasions, and to which 
their curiosity can always apply and be satisfied, the 
system cannot succeed. Fellenberg was himself the 
friend and instructor at the beginning ; but it was 
some time before he could meet with one to supply 
his place in a character at all times perhaps difficult, 
but then entirely new. At last he discovered in 



AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 27 

Vehrli, one of his pupils, the disposition, kindness, 
j simplicity, judgfiafa^jf tact, and knowledge, he re- 
quired. Thisv-gdraon entered completely into his 
views, perceived their extensive and beneficial na- 
ture, and felt the honour of assisting in so valuable 
and useful an institution. He acquired the prac- 
tical facility of conducting it, and did so with entire 
success until* he removed to a school of his own 
a few years ago. The following are the details of 
management : * 

The children rise in the morning at half-past 

* Children should be admitted at the age of five or six 
years, and remain in the institution till they are twenty-one. 
During the first ten years they are an expense to it : during 
the last fire years they repay, by their labour, all the previous 
outlay upon their education. They then obtain situations in 
the world — in agriculture, or in some mechanical art, and main- 
tain themselves like other workmen, by their skill and industry ; 
but being better taught and superior workmen, they more 
readily find employment ; and being of a better moral cha- 
racter, they fill places of more trust and emolument ; and 
possessing habits of greater economy and prudence, they turn 
their earnings to better account. 

In the year 1813, twenty-six years ago, a commission was 
appointed to visit and examine the agricultural school at Hofwyl. 
At the head of it was Reuyer, one of the most distinguished men 
in Switzerland. They spent six days in examining all its details 
— food, dress, accommodations, religious exercises, studies, 
labours, and occupations. It then consisted of twenty-three 
children, taken from the lowest classes, the highways and 
hedges, destitute and abandoned ; they were now living in har- 
mony, peace, and affection : punishment was seldom wanted ; 
when necessary, it consisted of mild rebuke, remonstrance, in 



28 AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 

four or half-past five o'clock, according to their age. 
Half an hour is allowed for washing, dressing, mak- 
ing their beds, and arranging their rooms. They then 
go to prayers ; then to lessons, for one hour in sum- 
mer, and an hour and a half in winter, and then to 
breakfast ; then the master allots to each class, or 
to each individual, his employment for the day. At 
eleven o'clock they dine, and then have a lesson of 
an hour or an hour and a half. At four or five 
o'clock, according to the season, they have bread 
given them, and a third lesson. At seven o'clock 
they sup, and the master reviews the work of the 
day, and the conduct of the children. Their beha- 

private, or in public before the other children ; exclusion from 
social meals ; and lastly, corporal, which, when necessary, is 
inflicted with the greatest consideration and concern, so that 
the pupil may perceive that nothing but necessity could have 
extorted it from the teacher. This necessity is explained to 
him ; the danger, degradation of character, and ultimate misery 
and ruin occasioned by crime, and the propriety of preventing 
refractory habits by bodily pain, when higher and moral motives 
are insufficient. Corporal punishment is never required except 
for new pupils. 

One evening, after an interesting lecture, Vehrli cautioned 
one of the children, without mentioning his name, to be on his 
guard against a fault he had committed ; immediately all be- 
came serious and silent, each seeming to take the reproof to 
himself. Very often, when conscious of having committed a 
fault, they pass judgment on themselves, and absent them- 
selves from meals ; Vehrli then sends them their food to a 
private room. In the year 1832 this school consisted of one 
hundred boys. 



AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 29 

viour and character are particularly noticed : praise 
or blame are bestowed according to circumstances ; 
and the motives, principles, and responsibilities of 
human conduct, are explained and illustrated from 
what has happened among themselves, as far as is 
suitable, and intelligible to their understandings. 
They then have prayers, and the youngest go to 
bed, while the older ones amuse themselves in any 
way they please — with reading or gymnastics, but 
generally with music, in which they delight, and 
which is made to serve a most useful purpose in 
softening their hearts and characters. The children 
of the Swiss peasantry are continually exposed to 
all weathers, and therefore become hardy and 
robust, and remarkably free from diseases ; the 
children of the agricultural school are brought up 
upon the same plan : they wear no hats, and in 
summer-time no shoes ; their clothing is simple, 
clean, and comfortable ; their bed a straw mattress. 
They assist in preparing their own food, which is 
the same as that of the peasantry — soup at every 
meal, vegetables, bread and milk. They eat meat 
only once or twice a-week ; and on holydays they 
are allowed the wine of the country. The children 
are habitually cheerful, happy, and healthy, which 
is a sufficient proof of their being properly fed and 
clothed. 

During the summer they spend more time in 
working on the farm than in winter ; but their em- 
ployment is adapted to the age and strength of each 



SO AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 

child. The youngest are occupied in picking and 
breaking stones, or in weeding. During harvest, 
ten or twelve hours are employed on the farm, and 
only between three and four in instruction. In the 
winter the school-hours are six or seven. 

When the weather does not permit them to go 
abroad, they learn to make baskets, and various 
useful works in straw, &c. They are all taught to 
mend their own clothes. 

In order to teach habits of order and carefulness, 
each child has a special office assigned to him : one 
keeps the chambers clean, another the furniture, an- 
other the pavement, &c. Three of them are chosen 
to superintend and inspect the whole, and are changed 
every three months, in order to accustom them to all 
kinds of work and duty. Even the youngest have 
some office found for them. 

They are allowed to work for their own profit. 
Each child has a garden of his own, which he cul- 
tivates with flowers or vegetables ; he collects all 
his manure from the roads, or from the dead leaves 
of autumn ; he either sends the produce to market, 
or sells it to the establishment, when he is allowed 
its value at the end of the year, with interest, even 
upon so small a sum as a franc. Two or three 
children will go shares in a garden or a fruit-tree, 
and dispose of the produce in the same manner. 
The elder ones constantly assist the younger ones 
in managing their ground. A principle of order, 
method, and the division of labour, pervades all the 



AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 31 

details of the establishment. The management of 
the farm is a distinct office by itself. The master 
of the children, though he works with them, has 
nothing to do with the accounts of the farm; he 
merely .works with the children, under the super- 
intendence of the bailiff, that his whole attention 
may be devoted to the behaviour and studies of the 
children. For some years, in the infancy of the 
establishment, when the number of children was 
small, Vehrli was able to superintend all the child- 
ren himself, and to study and influence all their 
characters : this became impossible when the 
number of the children increased. Vehrli then 
acted as general director, and under him assist- 
ants were placed; and it was found that fifteen 
or eighteen children were the greatest number who 
could be effectively superintended by one assistant. 
At the same time, Vehrli continued to watch over 
the whole, and to hold a private conversation with 
each pupil at least once in the week, and so to re- 
tain their affection and esteem. When the masters 
were thus increased in number, they held private 
occasional meetings, in which the general principles 
and objects of the institution were explained, obser- 
vations and suggestions made by each, and the con- 
duct and management of the pupils detailed ; diffi- 
culties were stated, and their remedies proposed. 

The first assistants were not easily found ; but 
as the establishment proceeded, promising pupils 
were selected, who were prepared for the future 



32 AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 

office. These went through a wider course of 
instruction than the rest, and were allowed the 
advantage of being taught in the higher school, 
which was formed by Fellenberg about the same 
time. Here they were also employed as the 
teachers of the junior classes of the higher school, 
filling the double office of teaching and being taught 
alternately. This plan has been found to succeed 
beyond expectation : the improvement in knowledge 
and manners, among those of the agricultural school 
who have studied and taught in the upper school, 
has been greater than any one had been sanguine 
enough to expect. 

The agricultural pupils are distributed into 
classes, both in their sleeping-rooms and their 
labour, according to age, capacity, and character. 
A pupil of doubtful or bad character is placed 
among those whose characters are confirmed and 
good, who exercise over him a salutary influence, 
according to the great law of sympathy, example, 
and the force of numbers and of opinion. 

The youngest classes, besides the inspector, who 
never quits them, have a selected pupil placed over 
them, who acts the part of an elder brother, over- 
looking and protecting them, and taking care that 
they keep their persons and dress at all times clean. 

The discipline of the agricultural school is mild 
and simple, like that of the other schools. It is 
based upon religion, and addresses itself to the con- 
science and the understanding, and not to fear. Its 



AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 33 

greatest reward is the pleasure and happiness of 
doing what is right ; the greatest praise it meets 
with is the sentiment of approbation. The constant 
superintendence under which a pupil is placed pre- 
vents his persevering in a fault : if he repeats it, he 
is reprimanded ; if it be of sufficient importance, it 
is reported to the superintendent. A reiterated fault 
is reprimanded more severely; and if that is not 
enough to prevent it, the pupil is separated for a 
time from his companions, Corporal punishment is 
rarely inflicted : when it is so, and is still ineffectual, 
the pupil is expelled, as being incorrigible, and too 
dangerous a companion for the rest. This case 
rarely occurs ; and when it does, it is among new- 
comers. The religious principle, with mild expostu- 
lation, generally produces a reform. 

Fellenberg considers the great art of a rational 
and methodical education to consist in finding active 
and useful employment for every moment of the day. 
Children are not able to do this for themselves — it 
must be done for them ; and whoever does it is the 
true and only educator. It must be done under a 
direction ; and then there is no time for idle, useless, 
frivolous, or mischievous employment, nor even for 
bad thoughts. All must be innocence where all is 
useful and agreeable, and where, by an incessant 
vigilance and inspection, nothing objectionable can 
be done, heard, nor seen. Thus vice is prevented 
from entering the school : it has not to be cured 
and driven out when it has taken root, for it is not 

D 



34? AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 

allowed to gain admission. This is no difficulty 
under proper arrangements, like those of Fellenberg, 
because, the children being happy, and interested in 
their pursuits, desire no other : all their faculties are 
gratified ; their curiosity, their desire of knowing 
the properties and uses of all surrounding objects ; 
their taste for nature, which all men are born with ; 
their taste for music and drawing, which are also 
common to all ; and their desire for active employ- 
ment, which is also universal in childhood. All the 
educator has to do is to direct these tastes and desires 
to useful purposes, and to shut out the approach of 
evil, and of all counteracting objects and occupa- 
tions. The system is very simple when once carried 
out into practice, as has been done by Fellenberg ; 
so that it is a wonder mankind have not discovered 
and adopted it before. 

This agricultural school affords the best model of 
education, not only for the children of paupers, but 
for those of all the peasantry. Their path in life is 
rendered simple, by their being furnished with the 
means of happiness ; every envious and hateful feel- 
ing is extinguished by the spirit of Christianity, and 
by the value they are accustomed to set upon a good 
conscience. All useless instruction is avoided ; yet 
no knowledge is despised or neglected which may 
hereafter become necessary. A knowledge of, and 
skill in, agriculture, by which they are to get their 
living, is made the means of cultivating their under- 
standing, and of forming their heart and character. 



ITS APPLICABILITY. 35 

The system might be imitated in all countries, upon 
the principle which Fellenberg has discovered, viz. 
that the earnings of the pupils from the age of fifteen 
to twenty-one are sufficient to repay the previous 
outlay. The expenses of Hofwyl are not entirely 
repaid, because the benevolence of Fellenberg in- 
duces him to receive the children of the peasantry 
without any engagement for them to remain till they 
are twenty-one, and many of them are removed be- 
fore that age, and before they have received the full 
benefit of the system ; but a sufficient number have 
remained to enable a general estimate of expense to 
be made. 

If such a school were established in another 
country, some of the difficulties which Fellenberg 
had to encounter might be avoided, and the expenses 
diminished, and the success of it rendered more com- 
plete. Fellenberg in the commencement could, as 
we have seen, use no selection in his children ; he 
took the destitute and the orphan under his care, 
without any regard to their individual disposition 
and character. He seems to have done so partly, 
as we have already allowed, from necessity, but 
partly, perhaps, to prove more clearly the truth of 
his system and principles : as if he had said, " You 
take the best children, and bring them up in your 
way ; I will take the worst, and bring them up in 
my way ; and mine shall turn out better workmen, 
better subjects, and better Christians, than yours." 
If he had made such a challenge, he would have won 



36 AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 

the prize ; as it is, he has proved his point, which is, 
that the making the working classes good workmen, 
subjects, and Christians, is a matter of choice, and 
may be effected any day, as soon as the upper classes, 
or a certain number of them, wish it to be so, and 
attempt to carry their wishes into effect by the means 
he has pointed out. 

Fellenberg considers that every man is born with 
the most valuable of all capital — the sum-total of 
his faculties of body and mind. But this capital is 
worth nothing till it is cultivated and employed; 
and the cultivation consists in what alone makes 
his capital profitable and productive — the educa- 
tion of the labourer. If this capital be brought 
out and educated, it becomes national wealth ; if 
neglected, the labourer becomes a burden, by con- 
suming more than he produces, and by becoming a 
destructive criminal. The capital of the labourer's 
possible skill and industry is like that of a mine, or 
the soil, — though ever so rich, it yields nothing till 
it is worked. One of the products of this capital is 
self-happiness ; and the happiness of every man de- 
pends upon the skill with which this innate capital, 
with which he is born, is worked. The truth is uni- 
versal, and applies to all ranks of life — Memoria nihil 
est nisi earn exerceas. The best natural abilities, 
which ought to constitute the happiness of the per- 
son and family to which they belong, are lost or 
perverted for want of education, or by an injudicious 
one. The amount of national benefit which would 



NATIONAL IMPORTANCE. 37 

be derived from a well-trained peasantry may be 
calculated numerically, as we calculate the amount 
of its crime. This calculation would far exceed the 
most sanguine views which have hitherto been taken 
of the improvement of man. When the moral im- 
provement of the labourer shall have become a 
general object of pursuit, upon the principles now 
proved to be practically possible, we shall have 
invented a moral railroad, by which the great ends 
of morality, religion, and national wealth, will be 
reached with as much speed and certainty as com- 
mercial purposes are accomplished by physical rail- 
roads. 

The peasantry who have been educated in the 
agricultural school of Fellenberg may be distin- 
guished from others who have not been so educated, 
by a kindly spirit, and a quiet, peaceable conduct, 
which never forsakes them. They are always ready, 
in the Christian spirit, to help and assist others ; and 
have no desire to quit their station in society, but 
are perfectly contented with their condition in life. 

If similar institutions should be attempted in 
other countries, and children should be admitted 
above five years of age, as at ten or fifteen, and 
still kept till twenty-one, the expense of the esta- 
blishment would be less, but the formation of cha- 
racter would also be less perfect. Those who are 
educated by the common methods, or who are not 
educated at all, must necessarily possess a character 
more or less vicious, at whatever age they are 



38 AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 

selected to be placed in such a school ; and this 
character, if not incurably bad, would take long to 
reform, and prove a serious injury to the institution. 
Such an institution, if unsuccessful, would be no 
argument against the agricultural system of Fellen- 
berg, though in proportion to its success it would 
confirm his views. Those establishments in England 
called " refuges" are under great disadvantages. 
They take children of a certain age, who are hard- 
ened in crime ; who have been educated in crime ; 
who have been rejected by society, and become out- 
casts on account of their crimes ; who have thus, as 
it were, been interdicted the use of earth and water, 
in being fit for no honest means of earning their 
daily bread, — who have never been taught any. Yet 
even these have been found capable of some reform, 
— willing to learn a trade, willing to work, sensible 
to kindness, grateful for it, open to religious impres- 
sions, and thankful for religious instruction. Had 
such children been placed under wholesome instruc- 
tion and training when infants, and continued so till 
twenty-one, it is impossible not to believe that they 
would have been, in all respects, useful and religious 
characters. The persons who have undertaken these 
institutions, under all their disadvantages, must pos- 
sess the highest and purest principles of our nature, 
great enlightenment of understanding, — great faith in 
the stability of the principles of man, in his moral 
and rational powers, when properly cultivated, — and, 
above all, a profound sentiment of the character of 



IMPERFECT IMITATION. 39 

God as viewed in its holiness, justice, and immutable 
rectitude, and love for his offspring. To believe 
that God is indifferent or opposed to the happiness 
and perfection of man, is one thing ; to believe that 
he will promote that happiness and perfection only 
through the use of means properly sought out and ap- 
plied, is another and a totally different position. He 
may delay the discovery of those means for ages, as 
he has done some of the most useful and valuable 
discoveries in art and science ; but as the means have 
been at length discovered of attaining great perfection 
in the one, we have a right to conclude, by a strict 
logical analogy, that they will be discovered in the 
other. Besides, we are not left even to analogy ; we 
have a more sure word of prophecy, that is, of Scrip- 
ture : for no one can be much in the Bible without 
seeing that all its preceptive morality is prophetic of a 
moral kingdom, at some future time to exist on earth, 
in which all arts and sciences shall co-operate to one 
great moral end, the Christian regeneration of the 
world. Revelation would be almost futile without it. 
Some such hopes and principles must have filled 
and animated the bosoms of those persons — call 
them philanthropists, call them Christians, call them 
people of common feeling and common sense ele- 
vated into a principle — who in this country, in the 
midst of many discouragements, both in the under- 
taking itself, and also in the low and unfavourable 
state of public opinion on the subject, could risk 
their credit and good name, could draw upon them- 



40 AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 

selves the responsibilities of the undertaking, could 
expose themselves to the ridicule and odium of party- 
interest, could compromise even their worldly pro- 
sperity, for the sake of exploring a new path of duty, 
which, though promising much in anticipation, was 
necessarily beset with piercing thorns in its com- 
mencement : 

Illis robur et ses triplex 

Circa pectus erat. 

MEYKIRCH. 

When Fellenberg had proved experimentally the 
truth of his ideas by the success of his agricultural 
school, he proceeded to prove it still more decidedly 
by the colony of Meykirch, six miles from Hofwyl. 
In the year 1816 he purchased fifteen acres of 
woodland. Thither he sent a master with about 
twelve children. They were to build themselves 
a house, to clear and cultivate the land, and to em- 
ploy their leisure time in learning to read and write, 
and the elements of knowledge. They were supplied 
with tools and materials from Hofwyl, and with food 
till they could raise enough for subsistence. In 
seven years they repaid all the expenses of their 
outlay, which was about 150/., and maintained them- 
selves upon their little territory. Fellenberg calcu- 
lates that fifteen acres of land would support a 
colony of thirty children upon this plan, which is 
the greatest number suited to such a system ; and 
that it might be established upon land not available 



MEYKIRCH. 41 

for the general purposes of cultivation. The only 
difficulty is, to obtain a superintendent properly 
qualified by temper, character, religious principles, 
and a complete knowledge of details. 

This colony was compared very naturally to the 
story of Crusoe upon the desert island. It drew all 
its supplies at first from Hofwyl, as Crusoe did his 
from the ship. The children were delighted at the 
comparison, and worked at their enterprise with the 
greatest alacrity and zeal, and became naturally 
strongly attached to the cottage reared by their own 
hands, and the land converted from a waste to a 
garden by their own labour. When these little 
emigrants arrived at the spot which was to be their 
future home, they found nothing but a shed on the 
side of a precipitous mountain, under which they 
slept upon straw covered with sail-cloth. They had 
to level the ground, and with the earth and rock to 
form a terrace in front, which soon became a garden. 
The cottage they built was of one story, with a 
basement which became the kitchen and dairy, which 
occupied together twenty-five feet in front. Above 
this was one room, about twelve feet wide, for the 
day-room, behind which was a dormitory of the same 
size, and behind this a stable of the same length, and 
about nine feet wide. An open gallery was in front 
of the day -room. At each end of the building was 
a shed about fifteen feet wide, and running back 
upon a level with the stable. So that the whole 
front of the building was fifty feet, and the depth 



42 MEYKIRCH. 

thirty-three ; and it was finished in about two years. 
The colony subsists upon milk, potatoes, and bread. 
Three hours a-day are devoted to instruction, the rest 
to labour accompanied by explanations. The same 
system is pursued as at Hofwyl : — reading, writing, 
drawing, singing, natural history, the history and 
geography of their country, common arithmetic, 
mental arithmetic, geometry, land - measuring ; a 
portion of botany, so far as relates to agriculture ; 
the nature of soils and manures, and the rotation of 
crops; platting, sewing, spinning, weaving; social 
prayer night and morning, religious conversations, 
Bible lessons ; the feelings and affections roused into 
action in the midst of their tasks ; the duties of life 
pointed out, as depending upon their relation to one 
another and to their heavenly Father, his universal 
love to his creatures, and the inexpressible glories 
of his works. In the prayers which the master and 
pupils offer up morning and evening, they never omit 
to refer to the advantages and blessings which they 
enjoy in this asylum, nor to pray that all orphans and 
destitute children, in all the world, may every where 
find kind protectors who may establish similar asylums 
for instructing and educating them, so that they may 
become good Christians and useful members of society. 
This colony is one of the most affecting sights in 
the world. To behold the happy results of youthful 
labour, the intelligence of the children, and their 
contented and grateful dispositions, living upon a 
fare which most people would despise, and eating 



MEYKIRCH. 



43 



nothing but the produce of their own exertions, having 
converted a wilderness into a garden, and made the 
desert to blossom as a rose. 

When Meykirch was first established, they wanted 
water. To attain it, they were obliged, under the 
direction of a skilful workman, to excavate a passage 
into a sandstone rock five feet in height and 280 in 
length. 

On Sundays they attend the service at the chapel 
of Meykirch, and very frequently at Hofwyl. 

An establishment like Meykirch possesses one 
very great advantage, peculiar to itself, over a large 
one like that at Hofwyl, which is, that the pupils see 
the whole fruit of their labours constantly under 
their eyes. The house they live in, the fields they 
cultivate, the food they eat, the clothes they wear, 
are all the produce of their own hands. It is strictly 
and properly their own. If any articles are brought 
from other places, they are bought in exchange for 
their own productions. But in a large establishment 
this sense of personal production is lost sight of in 
the multitude of producers, and the ramifications and 
changes of the produce. We cannot help thinking 
that there was a period in European history, when 
the wants of the peasants were supplied very much 
by domestic manufacture, and when the state of 
society resembled a good deal that of Meykirch; 
the children were brought up under the eye of the 
parent, and engaged in some kind of domestic labour, 
spinning, or knitting, &c, till they were old enough 



44 MEYKIRCH. , 

to go to field-labour. The contamination of towns 
had not reached the country, and the manners were 
more pure. If it ever were so, that state of society- 
has passed away, never to return ; and the benefits 
of it upon the character of the young must now be 
sought for by more artificial methods — by an en- 
lightened and Christian philanthropy anticipating 
evil habits by a precautionary system, and applying 
the best improvements of modern art, science, and 
moral management, to the judicious formation of 
habits of intelligent labour — in agricultural schools 
formed after the successful model of Fellenberg. 

« Agriculture," says Fellenberg, " seems to be 
peculiarly fitted by Providence for the education of 
poor, necessitous children. When taught systema- 
tically and intelligently, it excites the faculties of 
observation and reasoning, even among those who 
learn it only to live by it ; but the particular end 
which an enlightened benevolence proposes to itself 
will only be fulfilled in proportion as we teach the 
pupils to delight in assisting and obliging their com- 
panions while they are working on their own account. 
At Meykirch, the pupils are so situated as to per- 
ceive that these two objects, the personal and com- 
mon good, go hand in hand together. If new pupils 
arrive, their assistance is felt to be useful in com- 
pleting the common asylum. Their pleasures and 
enjoyments are in common : industry and Christian 
feeling are promoted by the same means, and travel 
together in perfect harmony. Is it going too far to 



MEYKIRCH. 45 

say, that that prayer, ' thy kingdom come, thy will 
be done on earth,' is here fulfilled ?" Destitute and 
abandoned children, who would otherwise perish as 
outcasts, here become Christians, and earn their sub- 
sistence contentedly, cheerfully, and gratefully. It 
js in nature, the grand laboratory of the Creator, 
which is now put in harmony with the Gospel, that 
we must seek for the means and elements of primary 
instruction and education. Our utmost wishes may 
be accomplished by placing the rising generation 
under the care of well- trained instructors, in the 
midst of nature, safe from the contamination and 
corruption of the dense and neglected population 
of towns, which cannot grow up otherwise than 
vicious. 

" When the pupils of Meykirch were made 
acquainted with the miserable state of Greece, and 
the multitudes of children which became destitute in 
consequence, they made a collection of what they 
could spare for their relief, and petitioned in their 
prayers that they might meet with the same educa- 
tion and protection which they themselves possessed. 

" It must not be supposed," says Fellenberg, 
" that education consists in removing difficulties 
from the path of the pupils ; it consists rather in 
teaching them how to surmount them. They must 
be taught to conquer both external and internal dif- 
ficulties : to overcome the first by steady labour, 
well directed ; and to master the second, viz. their 
own passions, by habitual self-command. No occu- 



46 MEYKIRCH. 

pation is so fitted for this purpose as agriculture, 
provided it be followed under a kind, judicious, 
and religious guide, who may direct and moderate 
the efforts of the pupils, which are sometimes apt to 
run into excess, as at others they would sink into 
idleness and disorder." 

Some years ago, the river Linth overflowed its 
banks, and converted a considerable tract of country 
into a useless marsh. An eminent engineer succeeded 
in draining this by a canal ; and it was proposed to 
establish upon the reclaimed land a colony of poor 
children, upon the plan of Meykirch. The plan hap- 
pily succeeded ; and while in progress, the children 
at Meykirch took a lively interest in it, made a col- 
lection for it, and offered up prayers for its prosperity. 

Should similar establishments be formed in other- 
countries, either for the education of destitute child- 
ren, or for the reform of criminal ones, like the re- 
fuges of England, Fellenberg recommends that the 
latter should vary in the strictness of their discipline 
and inspection, according to the character of the 
children sent to them. In proportion as these are 
more vicious and hardened, their labour should be 
more severe, their discipline more rigid, and the food, 
though wholesome, yet coarser ; and that the moral 
inspection should be more minute and searching, 
and moral and religious instruction more studiously 
impressed. Thus, the mind might be subdued through 
the body, and labour and temperance might pave the 
way to the subjugation of the passions and appetites. 



the girls' school. 47 

When the agricultural school was fully esta- 
blished, Fellenberg formed one for girls, upon a 
similar industrial plan, as far as the nature of female 
occupations permitted. All kinds of female industry- 
formed -the chief employment, and mental instruction 
was introduced as secondary and subservient to the 
former. The school was under the immediate care 
of Madame F. and her daughters. The object was 
to form good domestic or farming servants, or good 
managers and housewives for the peasantry ; at the 
same time that attention to mental cultivation, which 
consisted in practical moral principles, a knowledge 
of the Bible, and the adoption of its spirit as the 
practical guide of life, was made a leading object, as 
in the boys' school. 

We may take this opportunity of observing, that 
an industrial education in these days is totally dif- 
ferent from what it was, or could have been, a cen- 
tury ago. It would then have been mere labour 
without mental exertion, and without principles 
either moral or religious : that seems to have been 
the character of many of the old charity-schools; 
the children were kept to constant labour, like 
animals, in unwholesome apartments, and upon a 
bad diet, without any mental instruction whatever ; 
they were consequently cramped in mind and body ; 
the masters frequently abused their office, and over- 
worked and ill-treated the children. The present 
day-schools, which attend merely to mental instruc- 
tion, however imperfect in forming character, are 



48 THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 

still far superior to the old charity-schools. But 
the enlightened labour-school of Fellenberg gives 
to labour a moral character ; and the instruction 
with which the labour is accompanied, and the 
intelligence and kindness of the superintendent, 
give to the same name a totally different meaning. 
In this school the children, even if they were never 
to learn to read, would become more intelligent, and 
better qualified for service, than most of those who 
are now educated in our best national schools ; they 
would have a practical knowledge of an extensive 
kind. Agriculture taught in this way comprises in 
itself a vast fund of knowledge, and all of it of 
importance : soils, geology, mineralogy, drainage, 
land-measuring, manuring, chemistry; plants, vege- 
tables, forest-trees, fruit-trees, botany ; implements, 
machines ; animals, for labour or for food — their 
habits, food, management, — are but a few of the 
particulars. 

In Fellenberg's school the knowledge is chiefly 
communicated to the children by word of mouth, 
not from books. 

The secret of the system lies with the educator. 

THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 

Fellenberg would not have done justice to 
his comprehensive views and wishes, had he rested 
in his agricultural school. He conceived that the 
characters of all classes depended upon the habits 
and principles imbibed in their education. The 



THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 49 

-elementary faculties and principles of human na- 
ture are the same in all ages and in all classes. 
The character of the grown-up man depends upon 
the age in which he lives, the class in which he is 
born, and the education he has received in that class, 
—comprehending in that word not only his book- 
instruction, but the moral training, and the com- 
panions with which he has been trained, or those 
with whom he has associated. Peculiarities will 
arise in the intermixture of these principles, which 
may appear at first sight exceptions to general laws ; 
but they will be found, on examination, only to be 
branches of higher laws, and not to be by any means 
aberrations. Thus, the good sense, judgment, vigil- 
ance, intelligence, and piety of particular parents, 
may keep their children from contamination, and 
habituate them to right discipline from the cradle to 
the age when they are too old, and too enlightened, 
and too strongly confirmed in good principles, to be 
corrupted. Till the world becomes more moral and 
more Christian, this parental vigilance and good sense 
is perhaps our best hope for character ; but in the 
present state of the world it is of rare occurrence. 
Sometimes it seems to fail altogether, and the best 
parents, or those who seem to be so, have unprin- 
cipled and profligate children. But in these cases it 
will generally be found, that though the parents had 
some of the points of good educators, they had not 
all. In this case the moral argument is like the 
mathematical one — some of the necessary data are 

E 



50 THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 

present, others are absent. Can we wonder that the ex- 
periment does not succeed ? It is impossible it should 
succeed. Nature is consistent and logical ; she will 
bend to no one's caprice ; she is stern, inexorable, 
and unflinching in her laws ; she pities the weakness 
and blindness of her children, but she will not for- 
give them. Let no man hope to be unscathed in 
that warfare, in opposing the moral laws of nature. 

Again, an individual may be born with a rare 
combination of principles. He may possess the 
higher faculties strong, the lower ones weak. He 
may have a clear and strong conscience, a good 
judgment, an energetic will, a paramount sense of 
right and justice, with unconquerable firmness ; the 
lower appetites may be moderate or weak, they may 
require but little self-control, while he possesses it 
in abundance. The temptation, therefore, to do 
wrong is small; the inducements to do right are 
many and strong. Such characters exist from 
birth. Genius extends itself to morality, as well 
as to works of intellect and fancy. Some men are 
born great moralists, as others are born great poets, 
mathematicians, musicians, or mechanics. These 
are practical points of the utmost importance. They 
have never been studied by educators, nor even 
by metaphysicians. The moral children should be 
searched out, and well instructed, and be selected 
for the instructors and educators of others. Such 
characters will persevere in virtue, or goodness, or 
religion, call it what you will, in spite of all obstacles, 



THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 51 

and come out of the fiery ordeal of life victorious 
over all temptations. 

These considerations are not to lead us away 
from the general law or fact, that the character of 
the mass of mankind is formed by circumstances. 
Upon this principle Fellenberg proposed to establish 
a school for the higher classes, in which the usual 
branches of a first-rate education should be taught 
by the best masters; but the school should differ 
from others in the following respects : — 

1. The subjects taught should not be confined to 
a knowledge of Greek and Latin, but should com- 
prehend the elements of all subjects which are useful 
in the conduct of life, — modern languages, natural 
philosophy, natural history. 

2. The number of teachers should be increased, 
so that the teaching of each should be more com- 
plete, perfect, and satisfactory, by having fewer sub- 
jects and fewer pupils to attend to. 

3. No one subject should be considered as in- 
trinsically superior to another, but each should be 
important in its place ; and its relative importance 
should only be estimated like the objects of nature, 
in which nothing is predominant, and nothing can be 
spared. The whole would be imperfect without the 
presence of all the subordinate parts; and all are 
important in their place, and in the conception and 
plan of the great Architect. 

4. In giving this general education to all the pu- 
pils, there would still be room for making distinctions 



52 THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 

according to the taste and genius of individuals. 
When the individual taste was clearly declared for 
languages, or natural philosophy, or pure mathe- 
matics, or natural history, he could have the oppor- 
tunity of indulging that taste, in consequence of the 
abundant supply of masters or professors who were 
obtained to reside in the establishment. 

5. It was not an object of the school to be a 
nursery for other institutions, where excellence in 
some one acquisition was held to be the criterion 
of all human excellence. When this is the object of 
a private seminary, as in most English schools, all 
studies must be sacrificed to the one in which all 
excellence is supposed to consist. Thus, a particular 
species of composition used to be thought the per- 
fection of the human mind. Now composition is 
properly the order and arrangement of knowledge 
in a perspicuous method ; but scholastically it was 
nothing more than stringing words together accord- 
ing to certain arbitrary rules, and had no reference 
to the sense and the subject-matter. Thus nonsense- 
verses were once an important part of school-exer- 
cises ; and at all times it would be difficult to con- 
ceive how boys could learn to arrange knowledge 
when they had none to arrange. However, Fellen- 
berg avoided this difficulty, by discarding the idea 
that the acquisition of a prize constituted human 
perfection. 

Fellenberg's school has been improperly com- 
pared with other schools, as if success in getting 



THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 53 

prizes constituted the criterion of its merits. This 
was unjust to him, who never professed such an 
object. It might as well be imputed as a fault 
in the Gospel that it did not make scholarship its 
test of excellence. Fellenberg determined to be a 
Gospel-schoolmaster, or none at all; to make his 
pupils men of principle, while he enlightened their 
minds, and to leave prizes and academic honours to 
those who valued them. 

A great question has been raised in Europe of 
late years as to the methods of teaching Latin and 
Greek. We spend ten years in learning these lan- 
guages, and 1500/. of money, and at last we know 
them very imperfectly ; therefore, say the public, 
the method is bad. No, say the teachers ; you are 
idle and stupid. Then, say the public, since we are 
too stupid to learn the dead languages, teach us 
something useful. No, say the teachers ; we teach 
this or nothing. But Fellenberg says, " excellence 
in languages is like other excellence, — it depends 
upon individuals when the foundation is laid. Those 
who are properly taught will afterwards become 
proficients, if they have the taste and inclination ; 
those who have no taste will never learn, under any 
system. But if they learn not the dead languages 
at ordinary schools, they learn nothing. But we 
will give them the opportunity of learning, not 
merely the dead languages, which they may have 
no taste for, but that without which they are unfit 



54 THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 

for life, and which they may have a natural taste 
for, if not for " the dead languages." 

6. And again ; " we wish to form our school, not 
upon a system of prizes, but upon a system of charac- 
ter. We wish to teach our pupils in what excellence 
really consists, and not to mislead them with false 
views and erroneous estimates of human duty and 
responsibility. We do not teach them that excel- 
lence consists in any one acquisition whatever, but 
in the harmony of all, and chiefly in the use made of 
every acquisition. What we labour at, is not the 
quantity acquired, but the relative value of it, and 
the use made of it." 

Far be it also from Fellenberg to sit in judgment 
upon the particular use and application of old and 
national institutions. He is not a meddler; he 
does not condemn, or pull down; he assists, and 
builds up ; he had no wish that his institutions 
should spread before they were tried and found 
successful. He had no wish to supplant old institu- 
tions, but to form new ones, to serve as remedies for 
evils notoriously and widely existing. The scho- 
lastic subjects and methods of instruction might 
serve the purpose of education for a particular 
system of society, while it left untouched a con- 
siderable portion of evil which infested a collateral 
part of that system; and till a remedy was found 
out for the collateral part, the machinery of the 
other part might continue. But Fellenberg had no 



THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 55 

such system to support ; his was not a part of that 
scholastic system; and he might therefore be well 
excused in entering upon a new field, which, without 
interfering with any other, would supply certain 
wants Which were widely felt and complained of. 

" There is a large class of young men," says 
Fellenberg, " who are men of property and influence 
in different parts of Europe. They are sent to the 
present schools, because there are no others- They 
do not want a knowledge of the dead languages, nor 
do they want college- prizes. Prizes are no dis- 
tinction to them; they are distinguished by their 
hereditary renown. What they want, is the general, 
not the scholastic, cultivation of their mind. They 
want the elements of scientific, interesting, useful 
knowledge ; not of philology or school-logic. Above 
all, they want the cultivation of the heart, which the 
schools never taught. They want to know that they 
have a heart, a conscience, and an eternal responsi- 
bility ; that their birth, rank, and wealth, are but a 
responsibility, on which the happiness of thousands, 
perhaps of millions, depends even in this life, and 
for which they will have to account to their Creator 
and Judge in the life to come. To teach this is my 
business ; but to teach it is not the work of an hour, 
but of a life. A precept or a sermon will not effect 
it ; it requires a whole youth of training. They must 
be trained, not lectured. This, therefore, is the prin- 
ciple of my school, — to form the character. It is 
nothing to say, that my pupils cannot carry off prizes 



56 THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 

at Paris, Vienna, Berlin, Oxford, or Cambridge. I 
train them not for that, but to return to their fami- 
lies in peace, as affectionate sons, intelligent masters, 
vigorous in manly constitution, benevolent to their 
inferiors, loyal to their kings, upright in all their 
transactions. These are the objects which I propose 
to myself. By them I must be judged, not by aca- 
demical honours. I wish to form men apt and fit to 
exercise all the arts and honours of peace or war, as 
Milton has so well expressed it." 

Thus Fellenberg began his school for the higher 
classes ; and as it was not a preparatory school for 
any higher seminary, but one which professed to 
finish the education of those who frequented it ; and 
as he believed it to be desirable to form the mind 
by means of a circle of sciences or studies, he was 
obliged to imitate a university in introducing a com- 
plete universal course of languages, sciences, history, 
literature, drawing, music, &c. Still, the acquisi- 
tion of knowledge was made secondary to that of a 
good healthy constitution of body, and of firm moral 
and religious principles. He had obtained the secret 
of producing these effects in his agricultural school ; 
and by a judicious and discriminating modification 
of these means to the higher school, he succeeded in 
his object in that also. The number of hours de- 
voted to study in the higher school was increased, 
but they were fewer than in ordinary schools ; while 
the occupations of the pupils between the hours 
of study were so systematised, and arranged, and 



THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 57 

superintended, that no time was really idly spent; 
nor had the pupils the opportunity of acquiring 
objectionable habits. Gardening, agriculture, and 
gymnastic exercises, fill up the intervals between 
school- hours. A practical knowledge of agricul- 
ture, and of the construction of machines and im- 
plements, form a great subject of study, both on 
account of its healthiness, and because many of the 
pupils are heirs to large domains, in which their 
knowledge may be turned to the best account. 

The same preventive system of inspection pre- 
vails in both schools. The boys are not allowed to 
acquire vicious habits, and then lectured upon their 
sinfulness; but the formation of the habit is pre- 
vented by ever-watchful vigilance ; just as the eye 
of the parent is ever awake, in the early years of 
life, to prevent those numberless accidents and im- 
proprieties to which the inexperience, as much as 
the wilfulness, of children is liable. 

But this preventive system is not incompatible 
with the fullest enjoyment of the boys. The in- 
spector is present to prevent mischief and vice, not 
to check the sallies of youthful joyance. The in- 
spector is the friend, not the " pcedagogus acer" of 
the school. He is ever ready to explain, instruct, 
and to compose any differences which may arise, and 
never loses sight of the one grand principle of human 
life, that all men are brethren, tied to each other by 
different degrees of consanguinity, and that the hap- 



58 THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 

piness and well-being of the whole is made up of 
those of each of the individuals. 

The arrangements for the night are made upon 
the same principle. About twelve pupils sleep in 
one room ; but when they retire to rest they are 
accompanied by an inspector, who does not quit 
the room till all are asleep. It is impressed upon 
their minds that the night belongs exclusively to 
repose and sleep. As soon as the wants of the 
body are supplied, bed becomes relaxing and ener- 
vating both to body and mind. The pupils are 
therefore habituated to fall asleep as soon as they 
go to bed, and to arise at an early hour, as soon as 
they awake. The great secret of obtaining sleep is 
exercise in the open air, inducing bodily fatigue. 
It was long ago observed, that " the sleep of the 
labouring man is sweet, whether he eat little or 
much ; but the abundance of the rich will not suffer 
him to sleep." Thus the principles of a good educa- 
tion have been known to the wise for ages ; it may 
almost be said that Fellenberg alone has reduced 
them to practice. 

The relation between the highest and lowest 
classes of society has formed a subject of great 
dispute and uncertainty. Some have considered 
them as totally opposed to and incompatible with 
each other ; that wealth and rank on the one hand 
imply poverty and misery on the other; that in a 
perfect state of society, all should be equal. Some, 



{/ 



THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 59 

who approve of a distinction of classes, imagine that 
it is so far unnatural, that while it exists the lower 
classes must be degraded, discontented, and unhappy ; 
that consequently there always must be in them 
a latent spirit of insubordination and dissatisfaction, 
which can only be kept quiet by force in the higher 
classes acting upon ignorance in the lower ones. 

Fellenberg considers the distinction of ranks to 
be a natural law of man, and a providential appoint- 
ment of the highest and most benevolent wisdom. 
It provides for every kind of pursuit, occupation, 
and study. It brings all the faculties of body 
and mind to their highest perfection. Universal 
perfection may in a degree belong to mankind 
as a race, but it cannot possibly belong to man as 
an individual. The acquirement of one physical 
excellence is necessarily incompatible with that of 
its opposite ; so of the qualities of the mind. To 
bring to perfection all the bodily powers, a number 
of persons must be trained, each in his own depart- 
ment. Much more is this principle requisite in 
mental pursuits, which are infinitely more varied and 
incompatible than those of the body. 

The idea that the lower orders of society are 
naturally discontented, and envious of the higher 
classes, has arisen from this cause, among others, viz. 
that the upper classes, and the schools in which they 
are trained, have hitherto too much inculcated the 
principle of rivalry and an insatiable ambition. They 
have done all they could to spur on this principle. 



60 THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 

From the very cradle, taunting and invidious com- 
parisons are made; personal superiority is fostered 
and lauded for its own sake, as possessing an in- 
trinsic value ; rivalries and jealousies are encouraged 
and fomented. No independent rule of right and 
excellence is established. All excellence is resolved 
in a great measure into this, that it consists in some 
personal superiority over another. The inferior 
person is always more or less degraded. 

Those who have been brought up upon this prin- 
ciple imagine, that to be beneath another in rank or 
wealth is to be degraded, miserable, and discontented ; 
and therefore that the lowest class of society must 
necessarily possess these feelings, and be at constant 
enmity with the higher classes. Nothing can be 
more unphilosophical than this notion, or more re- 
pugnant to our conceptions of a wise Providence, 
or to the truths of revelation. The rivalry-spirit 
is one which belongs essentially to a barbarous state 
of society, not to one of Christian civilisation. The 
savage provokes every other savage to a jealous rivalry, 
while the Christian provokes his neighbour to love 
and good works. The rivalry of schools is one of the 
legacies of savage life, in which all happiness was 
deemed to consist in personal superiority. 

Fellenberg, relying on his conviction that the 
distinction of classes is a Divine appointment, con- 
siders that the better the two classes of high and low 
understand each other's real position and circum- 
stances, the less will the lower one be disposed to envy 



THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 61 

the higher one, and the more will the latter be 
inclined to respect and sympathise with the former. 
He therefore formed the two schools near each other, 
as parts of the same establishment. The pursuits 
and occupations of both were carried on in sight of 
each other. The higher pupils could observe that 
the lower ones had the same affections and faculties 
as themselves, and were as full of happiness and 
enjoyment, while their labour was absolutely neces- 
sary for the comfort of all ; that in the midst of this 
labour they were contented and cheerful, free from 
envious passions, and imbued with sentiments of 
respect and attachment for their superiors in rank ; 
that their minds were equally capable of cultivation, 
as far as their leisure-time allowed ; and that they 
were as capable of receiving pleasure from the beau- 
ties of nature and of art. Above all, they could see 
that they possessed the high principles of morality, 
and justice, and the love of truth, equally with them- 
selves ; that they were as incapable of falsehood and 
hypocrisy, and possessed hearts as bold, true, and 
loyal, as belonged to the best of the land. 

On the other hand, the agricultural pupils per- 
ceived that the condition of the higher pupils was 
not one of idleness nor of unmixed delight ; that they 
were subject to a discipline as strict as their own, 
though of a different kind ; that each hour brought 
its allotted task, which could not be omitted ; that 
during the hours of leisure and exercise, the enjoy- 
ments of each seemed to be equal ; that occasionally 



62 THE HIGHER SCHOOL. 

it was evident that the other pupils had secret causes 
of dissatisfaction peculiar to themselves ; that a more 
luxurious mode of living did not appear to be accom- 
panied with more pleasure than a more temperate 
one ; and that the expenses of the higher school 
were a source of immediate profit and advantage to 
themselves. 

Thus, in happiness and enjoyments the two 
classes appeared to be equal ; while in the pro* 
duction and distribution of the produce of labour, 
they appeared mutually essential to each other's 
comfort ; the labour of the one being necessary on 
the one hand, and the capital of the other on the 
other hand. 

Fellenberg's system allowed of an explanation of 
this mutual relationship, and afforded him the op- 
portunity of inculcating lessons of kindness and 
good offices among the higher pupils toward the 
lower ones. Presents were occasionally made to 
them, and assistance afforded, either in the purchase 
of useful tools, &c, or in times of sickness ; and the 
same charitable spirit was called forth towards the 
parents of the children who lived near, and towards 
the other peasants of the neighbourhood. Thus 
the end of Fellenberg was attained in the higher 
school; which was, not to produce great scholars or 
men of abstract science, but good men for every-day 
life, who might feel and acknowledge the brother- 
hood of all mankind, and promote, to the utmost of 
their power, the welfare of the community. 



VILLAGE SCHOOLMASTERS. 63 

VILLAGE SCHOOLMASTERS. 

When Fellenberg had succeeded in his three 
schools, he began to think how the blessings of the 
agricultural school might be conveyed to the vil- 
lages of his country where it was most wanted. For 
this purpose, he selected the boys who were most 
fitted for the purpose, and trained them for masters 
instead of workmen. When they quitted the esta- 
blishment, they returned to their native villages to 
act as common schoolmasters, and to train the child- 
ren under their care, as much as possible, upon the 
principles of Fellenberg, i. e. to form their character 
upon moral and religious grounds, and not merely 
to teach reading and writing as barren arts. 

Fellenberg also invited the village schoolmasters 
from all parts of Switzerland to spend their summer 
vacation ( which lasts nearly three months, on account 
of the peculiar summer-occupation of the peasantry 
and their children,) at Hofwyl, at his own expense, 
that they might study the details of the establish- 
ment, and particularly of the agricultural school. 
Every part of the system was explained to them ; 
and lectures were delivered, both explanatory of it, 
and also of those subjects which might be useful to 
them in their ordinary profession. 

The subjects more particularly attended to in 
instructing the village schoolmasters are — 1. Reli- 
gion; 2. the language of the country, in reading, 
analysis, understanding the subject read, the expres- 



64t SUMMER VACATION. 

sion of the thoughts by writing or in conversation ; 
3. arithmetic ; 4. writing ; 5. drawing ; 6. music. 
To these are added occasionally the most useful 
parts of natural history, anatomy, natural philosophy, 
geography, history of Switzerland, outlines of gene- 
ral history, history of Christianity. The instruction 
is partly by books, partly by the oral teaching of the 
professor. 

Though all these subjects are taught, yet the 
higher object of the heart and understanding, and 
the inculcation of good principles, are kept steadily 
and principally in view throughout. Fellenberg meets 
his pupils every evening, to review the work of the 
day, to encourage their efforts, to impress upon them 
the importance of order, neatness, and exactness in 
their own schools, of a discipline at once mild and 
firm, and the advantage of extending their influence, 
if possible, beyond the school-hours of the children, 
to their private pursuits and domestic conduct. 

The last days of their stay are devoted to a gene- 
ral examination of all that has been done, by the 
professors, and in the presence of deputies from the 
government of Berne. The last day is dedicated to 
a general fete, to which all the inhabitants of Hofvvyl 
are invited ; and on the following morning the 
teachers return home, each with his knapsack on 
his back, grateful for the generous hospitality they 
have received, and anxious to turn to good account 
their new talents among their native villages. 



INTERMEDIATE SCHOOL. 65 

INTERMEDIATE SCHOOL. 

One more institution was necessary in order to 
complete the circle of Fellenberg's benevolent and 
judicious ideas. He had now successfully established 
his model-farm with its workshops, his agricultural 
school for the poor, and his high school for the rich 
and noble : there wanted an intermediate school 
for the children of the middle classes, in which the 
usual branches of education might be taught at a 
moderate expense. The system of this school was 
to be less laborious and more intellectual than that 
of the agricultural school, and less intellectual and 
comprehensive than that of the high school. 

The great value of agricultural labour having 
been sufficiently proved, in forming the physical 
constitution and in influencing the moral character, 
and even the healthy condition of the intellect, a 
modified system of manual employment in the open 
air was introduced into this school; and whatever 
the employment was, it was made the subject of 
explanation and instruction, as in the agricultural 
school. 

Thus, in Fellenberg's system, no time spent in 
the open air is lost for the purposes of instruction, as 
it is in most schools. The business of the teacher 
is not over when the school is closed : he is still 
teaching by oral explanation and observation amid 
the work or even the games of the children. His 
book is then the great book of nature, " whose 



66 RECAPITULATION. 

minister and interpreter " he is, to use the language 
of Bacon. He is then surrounded by an infinity of 
objects which strike the senses with palpable lessons, 
instead of the dry, arbitrary characters of books, 
which too often convey no instruction at all. 

RECAPITULATION. 
Having thus presented a view of the history of 
Fellenberg's mind upon this important subject ; of 
his feelings of benevolence towards the destitute, and 
the vicious and criminal ; of his motives and reli- 
gious principles ; and of his machinery for attaining 
the object of his wishes, viz. an improved moral 
education and character, and improved intellectual 
abilities — we will here present those means at one 
view. 

1. A model-farm of the most approved methods 
of cultivation. 

2. An experimental portion, about one-tenth of 
the whole, for testing new ideas, new machinery, 
new plants, new methods of draining, manuring, 
ploughing, sawing, cutting, &c. 

3. Extensive workshops for manufacturing agri- 
cultural implements, either for private use or public 
sale. 

4. A workshop for the manufacture of model- 
machines, either of those in use, or of those im- 
ported from abroad, or of those proposed to be tried 
at some future period. 

5. An agricultural school for the children of the 



CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 67 

peasantry, whose chief employment is labour, under 
a well-informed teaching, either in the fields, garden, 
or workshops ; and whose intervals of labour are em- 
ployed in learning the elements of knowledge. 
- 6. A school of industry for girls, upon the same 
plan, as far as difference of sex permits. 

7. A provision for training masters for agricul- 
tural schools. 

8. A summer school for the instruction of village 
schoolmasters. 

9. An intermediate school for the education of 
children of the middle classes of society. 

10. A high school for the education of the child- 
ren of the wealthy and noble families. 

CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 
Fellenberg has succeeded in what constitutes 
the highest efforts of a great genius, i. e. in the har- 
monious union of elements apparently, and at firs f" 
sight, heterogeneous and contradictory. He has 
united labour with learning ; the acquisition of a 
trade or manual employment as a means of obtaining 
a livelihood, with the cultivation of the mind ; all 
the advantages of country pursuits, — fields, forests, 
mountains, fresh air, exercise, — with all the advan- 
tages of towns — books, society, professors, lectures, 
arts and sciences ; the contemporaneous education 
of the highest and lowest classes, each acquainted 
and sympathising with the other, knowing each other's 
character, pursuits, sources of happiness or anxiety, 



68 CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 

and yet not interfering with or incommoding each 
other, but, on the contrary, mutually benefiting, by 
the interchange of capital for the produce of indus- 
try, and by kindly offices, as in real life ; the public 
education, whose principle is discipline and strictness, 
and the mutual influence exercised amongst num- 
bers, — with the domestic training, whose principle is 
personal kindness, mildness, indulgence, and, when 
necessary, expostulation ; the most vigorous and 
manly health of the body, with the highest culti- 
vation of the mind ; the education of the peasant, 
with that of the legislator, the politician, and the 
nobleman ; the most gentlemanly manners, with 
manual employments of what would be thought a 
humble kind. He has made useful and laborious 
employments honourable, and directed honour into 
useful paths. He has shewn that agriculture, the 
most useful of all arts, is also the most moral and 
enlightening, and the most fitted for being made the 
basis of education, either for high or low ; that as no 
pursuit is more calculated to prevent vicious habits, 
so none is more effectual in eradicating them. Sleep 
is the grand restorative of body and mind ; it gives 
new vigour to the faculties, as well as to the body. 
Who does not know its effect in fixing an idea tena- 
ciously in the memory ? But it must be sound ; and 
sound sleep is the result remarkably of some kind of 
agricultural labour in the open air. Cincinnatus 
was called from the plough to command the army 
and the senate. Enough use has not been made of 



CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 69 

this memorable fact: it includes the profoundest 
wisdom, applicable in all ages. Fellenberg has 
almost alone understood it, has acted upon it, has 
systematised the principle, and sent his young nobles 
from practical agriculture to cultivate, adorn, and 
rule their own domains, and grace the courts of 
their sovereigns by unsullied integrity and enlight- 
ened ability. He has perfected, at the same time, 
the mind and the body ; he has also perfected con- 
jointly the heart and the head ; he has made religion 
predominant in the heart, and yet based the under- 
standing upon principles, — a difficulty seldom over- 
come ; for men are generally either superstitious or 
sceptical. A pupil at Hofwyl cannot be supersti- 
tious, for he is surrounded by facts ; he cannot be 
sceptical, for he is surrounded by evidence. No 
sooner has he caught a feeling than it is fixed upon 
a principle, upon a law of nature, and upon the 
Lawgiver of nature. Even his doubts are valuable, 
for their solution becomes to him a moral demon- 
stration. To doubt with an enlightened companion 
is to reason ; to reason is to prove. The strongest 
doubt, clearly solved, leads to the firmest conviction. 
Feeling and conviction are the two ends of Fellen- 
berg's lever. Uniting them, the human mind is at 
rest in principle, but ever progressing in knowledge, 
benevolence, happiness, and wisdom. 

Fellenberg has made all his children, from the 
orphan to the noble, from the peasant to the pro- 
fessor, revolve round one common centre, that of 



70 CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 

religion ; this is the secret of his influence. But 
he has drawn every one into activity ; this is the 
secret of his success. To converse with him, you 
would suppose him an apostle ; to visit his farm, 
workshops, schools, you would suppose him a man 
of business, a man of the world. On this account 
visitors to Hofwyl draw the most opposite conclu- 
sions from what they see, according to the time they 
stay, the parts of the establishment which they ob- 
serve, or the conversations they hear. One thinks 
Fellenberg an enthusiast, another a speculator, an- 
other an interested proprietor,- — because he has im- 
proved his property. To draw a fair conclusion 
upon a momentous subject, which is no less than 
the happiness of millions, and the peace of govern- 
ments, and their protection from a demoralising and 
revolutionary spirit, which has been long abroad, 
and perhaps is not yet quelled, — every part of the 
establishment should be examined, with the motives 
and views of the owner, and an induction made upon 
a full collection of facts. 

There is an analogy to this in nature. To look 
at the beautiful external world, we might mistake it 
for the Divinity himself: it was so mistaken in for- 
mer ages. God is matter, said the ancient sceptic ; 
and mind is matter, says the modern sceptic. To 
look into our own minds, and feel their spirituality, 
we might be tempted to conclude that spirit could 
not produce so opposite a substance as matter, and 
that matter is self-existent ; so says scepticism in all 



CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 71 

ages. The fact is, that every part of the universe is 
so important, and so teems with wonder in itself, 
that while surveying it, we see not the necessity of 
any thing else, nor the connexion which binds to- 
gether an infinity of wonders. 

Forty years have elapsed since the foundation of 
this establishment : we are unable to say how many 
since its entire completion and success, in the forma- 
tion of the intermediate school, the last stone of the 
edifice. But England has not yet sent a messenger 
to inquire the news and to report, " to bring the 
" grapes from the valley of Eshcol." Some few 
individuals have wandered so far, and have amused 
a small circle, on their return, with a partial detail 
of its phenomena, as they have done of the noble 
mountain-scenery in the neighbourhood. How few 
have understood the moral lesson I Three thousand 
children are annually committed in London as offen- 
sive criminals against the laws : they are annually 
punished, and again let loose upon society to live by 
crime. How few have inquired whether it be possible 
to reform them, and to make them useful members 
of society ; and whether there be a spot in the 
world where such children are reformed, or are so 
trained as not to need reform! Yet it has been 
proved that these children might be reformed without 
expense; for they would repay, by their labour, all the 
expenses of the reform. Yet no one has been offi- 
cially sent to inquire. Those to whom the guardian- 
ship of morals is committed have not inquired, How 



72 CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 

can crime be prevented, how can criminals be 
saved ? 

If it be allowable to love one's country instead 
of a party, it is to be hoped and prayed for, that 
some educator may soon arise, heaven -born, "to 
turn the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of 
the just," — to locate himself with thirty orphans or 
destitute children upon fifteen acres of land, there 
to build for themselves a sacred home, a house of 
labour, and a house of prayer and thanksgiving ; 
rearing around them the food they eat, and pre- 
paring the clothes they wear, or an equivalent for 
them ; and setting an example to the neighbourhood 
of peaceful content, useful labour, religious principle, 
and social happiness. Or when shall the educator 
arise for the higher classes — for that great majority 
of them who wish not to be great scholars or mathe- 
maticians, but men of useful knowledge and common 
sense, — a knowledge which belongs to their own 
business and bosoms, which shall qualify them for 
the management of their estates, and for the im- 
provement of those who live upon them, their 
tenantry and their peasantry ? 

This is now the consummation devoutly to be 
wished for. The effect of punishment, as an instru- 
ment of reforming the human mind, has been tried, 
and has failed. Prisons, hulks, transportation, death, 
have had their fair experiment. The invention of 
legislators and judges has had a full trial, and has 
effected almost nothing ; and is only persevered in 



CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 73 

from a sense of overwhelming necessity. Let the in- 
vention of an English Fellenberg be now applied to, 
to do that by prevention which others have in vain 
attempted as a cure. 

And yet there is no obstacle in the way of the 
educator when he shall appear. He has but to do 
his work and prosper. If he shall shew an example 
of an English Meykirch, men will see and believe ; 
and some who see w r ill go and do likewise. If the 
laws of England have provided no educator, neither 
have they forbidden one to be provided. He is in 
the moral world what a new machine is in the manu- 
facturing world, — a desideratum. He will be re- 
ceived, when he appears, with open arms and with 
smiles, rather than with frowns. Let him only arise, 
and he will prosper. Such is our fervent wish and 
our increasing conviction. It is impossible that the 
'success of Fellenberg can fall to the ground, or be 
lost upon England. 

England deliberates before she acts. She col- 
lects her facts before she draws her conclusions. She 
may occasionally appear to sleep ; but she is only 
then pondering, in order to choose, decide, and act. 
Her institutions for religion, charity, arts and sciences, 
cover the land, and are still increasing. When she 
has once caught the idea of moral institutions for the 
practical formation of character in early life, she will 
display the same sagacity, integrity, and ardour, in 
this humane, enlightened, and glorious march, as in 
all the other brilliant achievements of her history. 



74? CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 

Crime and pauperism, the present great blots in her 
scutcheon, will diminish, and perhaps by degrees 
disappear ; and she may then send forth with con- 
fidence her swarms of hardy, virtuous, and intelligent 
peasants and mechanics, to cultivate her numerous 
and vast colonies, carrying with them the religion, 
laws, arts and sciences of their forefathers, to people 
the wilderness, to make the desert blossom as the 
rose, and to gladden the valleys with industry and 
plenty. 

Her language, religion, and national freedom, 
will spread to unknown lands ; she will instruct and 
convert savage nations, and Christianise the heathen ; 
and if, in the midst of her earthly glories, she main- 
tains a humble, grateful, and devout spirit, rendering 
due honour and homage to Him who has honoured 
her, she may long continue a great instrument in the 
hands of a beneficent, but mysterious, and withal a 
retributive Providence, for civilising, enlightening, 
blessing, and perfecting mankind. 



Note to p. 40. — The colony of Meykirch was put an end 
to in -the latter part of the year 1835 : the pupils returned to 
Hofwyl. Fellenberg was unable to purchase more waste land, 
which would have been requisite in order to continue and ex- 
tend the colony. The object of the experiment had succeeded 
in proving the possibility of redeeming waste land, and making 
it pay its own expenses. The land was then let as a regialar 
farm. 



NOTE A. 

The following remarks on the subject of religion, 
drawn from various parts of Fellenberg's writings, 
appeared to be too great an interruption to the im- 
mediate object of the work to be introduced into the 
body of it ; but as they could not be omitted with 
justice to his general character, and as they contribute 
to give it a finer polish and a deeper tone, they are 
here recorded. 

The nature and law of the human mind is a law of 
birth and commencement — of a nascent, incipient being 
— a law of development and improvement — a law of 
continual progress, of indefinite and perhaps of infinite 
extent, — we therefore follow that law from the begin- 
ning, and make it, not only the basis of all instruction, 
but also its constant companion ; testing, balancing, 
and supporting every thing ; and appropriating every 
acquisition to its proper position and station. 

There are two points, among others, to be considered 
in religion — the one is, the idea of a revelation itself; 
the other, that of the life and character of the Author 
of the Christian revelation, Jesus Christ. The first 
involves the idea of the want of it to man himself, 
considered as a moral agent, and with reference merely 
to his situation in this life. Man is said to be com- 
pounded of a low and a high nature — the one, which 
he has in common with the brutes, of an animal appe- 
titive kind, continually urging him to the preservation 
of the body and of its grosser gratifications ; the other 



76 NOTE A. 

enabling him to look upwards to art, science, intellect, 
right and wrong, and the world of mind and of spirit. 
The low nature comes first into exercise, anticipates in 
a measure the high one, and fixes all the habits against 
it, before the period of its action and influence. Hence, 
when the higher nature begins to operate in the mature 
man, and he awakes, as it were, from the dreams of 
youth and of imagination, to the realities and responsi- 
bilities of his moral being, he finds himself too often in 
a wilderness where he expected a paradise. His youth 
has too often been both mispent and badly spent ; it 
has not only been negative as to good, but positive as 
to evil. During that period, habit, the law of our 
nature, has formed us in spite of ourselves, and brought 
us into wretchedness, from which we strive in vain to 
escape. "We may say, in a certain sense, that without 
any fault of our own, but by the irresistible influence 
of the circumstances of our education, we find our- 
selves devoted to the lower part of our nature, and 
strangers to the higher part. Such would be the history 
of mankind, if left to their own natural faculties. They 
would never be able to rise above the animal part of 
their nature, nor above the savage state of society. If 
we observe some nations of antiquity, previous to all 
knowledge of a revelation, making some advances 
beyond this state of degradation, we must consider it 
as owing to the general arrangements and operations 
of Providence, with reference to an existing partial 
revelation, and an intended universal one. The an- 
cients did hot owe their progress, strictly speaking, to 
the force of their natural faculties, but to the secret and 
unknown superintendence which they received from an 
affectionate Providence, who had better things in store 



NOTE A. 77 

for his family of man, and was preparing the way for 
happier times and seasons. 

As a further proof of this, we see that even in our 
day, with all the advantages we possess of knowledge 
and the diffusion of Bibles, yet all which has hitherto 
been accomplished by parents, nature, and conscience, 
in the education of children, has been inadequate to 
insure to them Christian minds and dispositions. We 
fail even with the Bible in our hands — what could we 
hope to do without it ? 

This is one view of the nature, value, and necessity 
for a revelation, viz. the impossibility of ever raising 
man above a savage state without it — above a life of 
sensual indulgence and gratification, into a moral and 
intellectual life, aspiring to improve and exalt his own 
character, and benevolently endeavouring to soothe the 
ills of suffering humanity, the afflictions and wants of 
those around him. Men would have no fellowship 
with men, without the principles of a revelation, but 
would live the life of tigers, with ingenuity added 
to their savage faculties to heighten their natural 
ferocity. 

Another view of a revelation is, that without it we 
could never know what our nature is capable of, even 
in this life, much less in another; We could not know 
that this mind, so weak and feeble, so ignorant at its 
birth, so full of appetite and passion at a more advanced 
age, does yet possess within it a germ of immortality 
which cannot be destroyed nor separated from it, which 
may unfold itself, even in this life, into a character of 
high and consummate excellence. We are authorised 
by revelation, and by revelation alone, to pronounce 
upon the possible character of man, and to assert that as 



78 NOTE A. 

a certainty which would without it be considered only 
as a poetic dream. Indeed, the assertions of revelation 
respecting the future development of the human cha- 
racter, though they deal in certainty and fact, are more 
sublime and glorious than poetic imagination has ever 
yet been able to conceive, — not only more than it has 
dared to conceive, but more than it has been able to 
conceive. They fully justify the hopes and exertions 
of those, in modern times, who have been called, rather 
in derision, the Philanthropists, but who have been able 
to conceive and to appreciate this exalted view of the 
future human character which revelation declares will 
take place, and who have very consistently searched 
zealously and indefatigably for the means which, ac- 
cording to the principles of human nature and the 
ordinary dealings of Providence, are calculated to con- 
duce to that end, among which an improved system of 
moral (including in that term religious) education is no 
doubt the most efficacious. 

The other point of revelation, viz. the life and cha- 
racter of the Author of Christianity, is another subject 
of consideration for those who engage in the education 
of the young, with the hope of establishing their cha- 
racter upon a Christian basis. The divine Author of 
Christianity did not merely give the world a set of 
precepts of a superior moral tendency, and leave them 
to make their own impression upon it, but he lived a 
life of illustration ; so that what he practised, rather 
than what he taught, contained the principles he wished 
to enforce. He desired his followers, and through them 
all mankind in all ages, to live as he lived, as well as 
to practise his precepts ; for all his precepts were em- 
bodied in his life, and became practically explained and 



NOTE A. 79 

exhibited in it ; so that had he said nothing in the 
way of precept, his principles and maxims would have 
become evident to the attentive student of his character, 
and intelligible to those who wished to become his dis- 
ciples, and to follow him in the moral of his life. 

We must remember as educators, that the whole Bible 
is a record of a similar principle, that is, an illustration 
of high human character by the example of many emi- 
nent men devoted to the entire sacrifice of self, in order 
to attain to that purity and dignity of nature which 
was intended for us by our great Creator. It is true 
that these men have intermixed many precepts with 
their own histories, and that many are also recorded 
unconnected with practical examples ; but wherever 
they stand, they are illustrated, and made visible and 
intelligible, by the living examples which succeed each 
other, like characters in a drama, throughout the whole 
of the history. It is not a little remarkable that, with 
so many bright examples before us, we should at last 
have One so much brighter as to cast all the rest into 
the shade. One, not a citizen of a particular region, 
with a certain mannerism about him unsuited to an- 
other clime, but a citizen of the world, speaking and 
acting like ourselves, so as to appear almost to belong 
to our own age as much as to one of two thousand 
years ago. There is a natural simplicity and propriety 
about the precepts, and actions, and conduct of Jesus 
Christ, which seem to belong and to be suitable to 
every age and to every country. He is, in all respects, 
the perfect model of a perfect and faultless human being ; 
a model which, on that account, as well as on many 
others, can never be hoped to be reached by any other 
person : but still its perfect naturalness and propriety 



80 NOTE A. 

render it most proper to be set before all ages and 
classes, as their model of excellence, which they are to 
study, to understand, and to imitate, as far as circum- 
stances, and their own powers, and the will of God 
permit. This, then, is another point in which revelation 
is invaluable. It has given us a model of which we 
can say — Look at this, and imitate it; " go thou and 
do likewise ;" " look unto me, and be ye saved, all the 
ends of the earth." Here is a model and a prophecy — 
a rule and an example — a direction and an encourage- 
ment. From this we draw an unanswerable inference 
in favour of the future amelioration of the character of 
man on earth. It would have been trifling with human 
hearts, if so much precept, and so perfect an example, 
had been given us in vain. Had the improvement of 
man on this earth been an impossibility, had it not been 
contemplated in the order and intentions of Providence, 
all religious precept, history, and example, would have 
been thrown away ; it would have been little less than 
a mockery of poor human nature. No ; the precept 
and history of the Bible looks to a future earthly reality ; 
and the model of Jesus Christ, though far above what 
man will ever reach, is nevertheless a type towards 
which he will be continually tending, while he is con- 
tinually polishing off the deformities and roughnesses 
which render him as yet so infinitely inferior to his 
great original. 

We may remark further, with respect to revelation 
in general, that it harmonises in the most perfect man- 
ner with the instructions which the Deity has already 
afforded us, in so many ways, in the sphere of what is 
called natural religion, concerning our highest good. 
It adds a full security to our faith, which would have 



NOTE A. 81 

no solid ground to rest upon, if left to itself without a 
higher sanction, considering its situation amid many 
difficulties, arising from the ignorance, scepticism, and 
vices of men. Revelation, in the midst of a world of 
selfishness, inculcates the most extensive and noblest 
benevolence, and the most active and disinterested phi- 
lanthropy. It teaches, or rather commands us (for all 
its precepts are commands), to love, not only our natu- 
ral friends, but our enemies also, those who may have 
sought our injury. It recommends this sentiment by 
actions as well as by words, in the exhibition of the 
life of its Founder, who spent his life in doing spon- 
taneous and unrequited good to men of all parties and 
opinions and of all nations, knowing beforehand that 
some of these very persons would assist in putting him 
to death ; and who crowned all his other philanthropy 
by voluntarily suffering a cruel death for the sake of 
shedding incalculable blessings upon all races of men 
through time and eternity. Without this love, philan- 
thropy, and death, mankind would have been as much 
lost as the independence of a nation is whose armies are 
beaten in the field, and her capital in the hands of her 
enemies. Such would have been the lot of miserable 
man, — a prey to savage ferocity, ignorance, crime, and 
woe. Revelation comprises a moral law for the gradual 
improvement of man, which eighteen centuries have not 
only not been able to improve, but have not yet arrived 
at the perfect comprehension of ; for when any modern 
philanthropist, after the example of Jesus Christ, con- 
ceives the possibility, and attempts to prove the prac- 
ticability, of realising the moral code of Christ in the 
hearts of the young, by a more careful and judicious 
education, he has frequently been looked upon as a 

G 



82 NOTE A. 

visionary enthusiast ; according to which view Jesus 
Christ himself must have been a visionary enthusiast, 
and must have died in vain, when he contemplated the 
happiness, improvement, and salvation of man as the 
consequence of his death, — a supposition almost amount- 
ing to blasphemy. The moral code of this revelation 
penetrates the sanctuaries and inmost recesses of human 
nature, leaves neither depth nor height unexplored, and 
is adapted to the peculiarities of all periods of life, con- 
ditions, and nations. It has continued to advance and 
spread for eighteen hundred years, and to triumph over 
the prejudices and vices of men, notwithstanding the 
weakness and frailties of those to whom it was committed. 
It has maintained itself against all the attacks of its 
enemies ; and through all these contests, as through a 
series of confirming and purifying trials, it has become 
at this period, what it will continue to be more and 
more, the highest glory of God the giver, and of man 
the receiver. 



APPENDIX. 



We here subjoin an abstract of the opinions and senti- 
ments of Dr. C. H. Scheidler, professor of theology 
at Jena, on the subject of education in Europe, and of 
the establishment of Fellenberg. He calls his book, 
" The Vital Question of European Civilisation ;" and 
he views the system as seriously connected with the 
present and future well-being of society in Europe. 

" It appears to me necessary to make a few histori- 
cal and political observations on the present critical 
condition of our civilisation. We behold two broad 
and striking facts, the increase of poverty in the lower 
classes of Europe, and of demoralisation in all. The 
disorganisation which exists to so great a degree 
in France and Spain, exists in a less degree in all 
Europe. The political horizon is gloomy : the con- 
tinuance of peace seems doubtful. If a general war 
begins, no one can calculate its awful consequences 
amid a population at once so enlightened and de- 
moralised. We ought therefore to seek for remedies 
in time; and if any probable ones are in existence, 
to apply them judiciously and boldly to our position. 
We must not be content with mere suggestions and 
proposals of improvement, since these would justly be 
deemed Utopian ; but we must require practical ex- 
periments of many years' growth, such as may satisfy 
the minds of practical statesmen in these critical times. 



84 APPENDIX. 

" The visionary schemes for promoting the improve- 
ment of society which were proposed by St. Simon, 
Fourier in his Social Colonies, and Owen in his La- 
bouring Communities, prove the morbid state of societj^ 
its passion for excitement, and its dislike of regular, 
steady application of body or mind, at the present 
moment. 

" No improvements which relate only to the out- 
ward forms of society will reach the evil. Even an 
extended representative system, however good it may 
be in itself, is insufficient. These outward forms re- 
quire an inward guarantee ; for they may at any time 
be annihilated by a coup d'etat. Improvement can 
only arise out of a respect for what now exists, endea- 
vouring to modify and improve it, but not to super- 
sede it. 

" In every respect, the educational establishments 
at Hofwyl appear to answer the demands of the day. 
They point out, in a positive and practical manner, a 
radical cure for the corruptions of modern civilisation. 
They do not present us with imaginary proposals, but 
with substantial and accumulated facts, which have 
been tested by the experience of many years. They 
contain a whole, consisting of many parts, every one of 
which maintains its own proper and specific relation to 
the rest, and to the natural concerns and business of 
life. 

" In order to understand them properly, we must 
go back to the period preceding their formation, and 
the attempts then made, by different individuals, to 
arrest the progress of social demoralisation. 

" Rousseau was one of the first of modern geniuses 
who strongly pointed out the evils of modern society, 



PROFESSOR SCHEIDLER'S SENTIMENTS. 85 

the corruptions of the higher classes, the narrow 
pedantry of the learned, the universal attention paid 
to a dry intellectual culture, and the utter neglect of 
the heart and affections. His constitutional character, 
no doubt, led him into extremes ; he took morbid views 
of life, and even considered all civilisation as an evil, 
and neglected too much the consideration of religion as 
an element of social progress. Still, his writings had 
great influence, particularly in Germany. Basedow, 
Campe, and Salzmann followed, who though they had 
great errors, yet opened a larger range for the educa- 
tion of the mind generally, particularly in the study of 
the mother tongue and of the natural sciences. 

" These improvements, however, were confined en- 
tirely to the upper classes ; nothing was done for the 
middle and lower ones. 

" Next arose Henry Pestalozzi, a man of distin- 
guished abilities, destined to point out to others the 
proper road by which the vices and decline of modern 
civilisation might be combated and subdued. His life 
coincided with that great event, marking the vices of 
European civilisation, the French revolution, in which 
also the democratic principle first appeared as the an- 
tagonist of the ancient aristocratic principle. Pesta- 
lozzi possessed a lively imagination, fervour of mind, a 
strong sense of right and of compassion for the oppressed 
and suffering. He first followed the profession of juris- 
prudence and public life ; but having given offence by 
his hostility to the injustice of some of the political pro- 
visions of his country, and Rousseau's works on educa- 
tion having then appeared, he determined to follow 
out his views of the amelioration of the disposition and 
heart of man, by devoting himself to practical educa- 



86 APPENDIX. 

tion. He too had his faults in this new path : he had 
too much dislike for learning and science ; he did not 
sufficiently appreciate existing relations ; and he did 
not make use enough of Christian principles, though 
he possessed the true Christian disposition himself. 
Still, we must rank him among the most distin- 
guished men of our time, by the power and depth of 
his mind, by his self-sacrificing love and enthusiasm in 
the great cause of human improvement in spite of his dis- 
appointments, and by the impulse which he gave to edu- 
cation throughout Europe by his improved methods of 
early instruction, which still continue to work, and must 
do so, being founded in nature. They have also been 
adopted and further developed, by the successful ex- 
perience of many years, by his friend Fellenberg, whose 
flourishing institutions are an indisputable and consoling 
proof of the practicability of arresting the decline of 
civilisation, and of preventing its anarchical tendencies. 
Though they are in themselves individual and local, yet 
"having once succeeded, they are capable of being applied 
in any country and by any person, or even by public 
authority, to check the demoralising influences of a 
state of over-civilisation. 

" Philip Emanuel von Fellenberg was born in June 
1771, at Berne, of a family distinguished for patriotism 
and high character. His father was professor of juris- 
prudence, then a member of the Bernese Sovereign 
Council, prefect of Wildestein in the canton of Aargau, 
and afterwards a senator at Berne. He was as much 
distinguished for learning as for integrity and upright- 
ness. His mother was the grand-daughter of the cele- 
brated Dutch admiral Von Tromp. Her early lessons 
had great influence in forming the mind of Fellenberg 



PROFESSOR SCHEIDLER'S SENTIMENTS. 87 

to the love of his country and of humanity. His 
teachers were Rengger, afterwards minister of the in- 
terior Swiss central government, and Lereche, after- 
wards professor of theology at Lauzanne. He was 
then sent to the institution of Pfeffels at Colmar, and 
next to Geneva. In 1789 he went to Tubingen, where 
he studied jurisprudence under Hofacker, and then the 
philosophical sciences. On his return home he devoted 
himself to the classics and the Kantian philosophy. 
For several years he travelled over all Switzerland and 
the south of Germany ; and having formed an early 
acquaintance with Pestalozzi, who was twenty -five 
years older than himself, he became convinced like 
him of the critical state of society, and its threatening 
demoralisation in public and private life; and that 
nothing could resist its ruinous tendencies but a re- 
generated national education among all classes. His 
sagacious apprehensions were fully confirmed in the 
outbreak of the French revolution. He went to Paris 
in the year 1795, which convinced him still more of the 
truth of his ideas. After this he devoted himself to the 
study of agriculture, taking no part in politics till 1798, 
when the revolution of Switzerland, effected by the 
French Directory, compelled him to join the patriots, 
which he did with so much zeal, that a price was set 
upon his head by the French commissioner Mingaud, 
and he was obliged to emigrate. He afterwards dis- 
charged with ability the duties of quarter-master of the 
upper circles of Berne. In the end of 1798 he superin- 
tended the contributions of clothes and food from the 
canton of Berne to that of Unterwalden, deplorably 
pillaged by the French. He was soon after sent by 
the Swiss central government to Paris, on a commis- 



88 APPENDIX. 

sion of great delicacy, where he had reason to be ex- 
tremely disgusted with the conduct and principles of 
Reubel and Rapinat. On his return home, he pur- 
chased Hofwyl, six miles north of Berne, containing 
four hundred and forty Magdeburg acres,* where he 
entered upon his plans of agricultural and educational 
improvement, which he has pursued ever since, now 
nearly forty years, having devoted to it his whole pri- 
vate fortune of about 20,000/. His first attempts drew 
upon him the odium of the aristocratic party, which 
was suspicious of his intention, and the consequences of 
his plans ; and afterwards of the democratic party, which 
thought them equally hostile to their interests. 

" In 1830, in consequence of the regeneration of 
Switzerland, he became a member of the constitution, 
and afterwards of the council and of the educational de- 
partment, and in 1833 landamann of Berne, the highest 
office in the state, which last office he soon resigned, in 
order to devote himself more completely to his own insti- 
tutions. These he offered to present to the state on certain 
considerations, in order to establish them in perpetuity ; 
but was prevented by the illusions, the envious and jea- 
lous passions, and the cabals of his contemporaries. 

" Fellenberg cannot be understood except we go 
to his principles. It never was his intention merely to 
give to a few individuals instruction on a better plan 
than any other institution offered ; his intention was, to 
prove a principle applicable to the whole of society, 
that principle resting upon revealed religion as a basis, 
— a point too much neglected by preceding educa- 
tionists. He assumed that God had created in man 

* Two English acres contain three Morgen (the above- 
named measure) and a few square feet. 



PROFESSOR SCHEIDLER'S SENTIMENTS. 89 

certain dispositions and faculties, by the moral training 
of which, together with the physical training of the 
body, the happiness and perfection of the individual 
and of society were to be brought about ; according 
to the expression of the apostle, i the new man, which 
after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.' 
He considered that this image might be destroyed 
by a perverted education, as it might be developed 
by an appropriate one. Labour he looked upon not 
in the old light of a disgrace and an evil, but as the 
honourable means of health and independence. 

" He insisted, moreover, that the existing relations 
of society must be deeply respected, as founded on the 
will of God, till they could be improved by time, — a 
point which Rousseau and others had overlooked. He 
viewed the state as a generalisation of the family, and 
possessing the same principle of subordination and of 
mutual dependence and affection. The wisest of the 
ancients took the same views, as Pythagoras, Lycurgus, 
Plato, Aristotle, which they could not carry out fully 
from the absence of Christian principles. He wished 
the family-principle to reign in his schools, which they 
were to aid, and assist, and develope, but not to destroy, 
nor to slight and deteriorate. While he adhered thus 
closely to the practical routine of life, he always had in 
his mind's eye the great ideal perfection of the whole 
man and of all men, held up to us so clearly and beau- 
tifully in the Christian code, that God will have all men 
progress till they reach ' the measure of the fulness of 
the stature of Christ.' 

" He allowed of no theory in education but what was 
inductive, according to the aphorism of Goethe, ' Be- 
lieve in life ; it teaches better than orator or book.' 



90 APPENDIX. 

Nor did he expect that any one system in educa- 
tion would solve all difficulties, or be applicable to 
all characters. He believed that each individual was 
created with a specific character and genius, which it 
was the duty of the educator to study and to manage ; 
and that the peculiar disposition of each pointed out the 
destination intended for him by Providence. Hence 
he views education as a species of self-cultivation, which 
enables the individual to bring to perfection his peculiar 
talents, so that he may produce the greatest amount of 
good to himself and others. 

" Having considered the increase of pauperism as 
one of the greatest evils of modern civilisation, both 
in itself and in its being the necessary cause of a moral 
and criminal degradation as extensive as itself, and 
indeed much more so, on account of the contagious 
and absorbing tendency of low moral notions, — he 
applied himself earnestly to the solution of the problem 
of physical or economical independence. He suc- 
ceeded most happily in proving the practical needless- 
ness of pauperism, by the profits of the labour of his 
industrial school above its expenses ; and, warned by 
the example of Pestalozzi, that no system can prosper 
without a prosperous economy, he paid great attention 
to the profits of his own estate as one of his leading 
duties. He thus established the soundness and prac- 
ticability of his plans by a double argument, — the edu- 
cation formed the moral and industrial character of the 
children, and the labour of the children repaid the ex- 
penses of their education. The same results might be 
obtained by nations now the example is before them. 
They might ensure the moral and religious character of 
their pauper-children, and their industrious independ- 



PROFESSOR SCHEIDLER'S SENTIMENTS. 91 

ence ; and the labour of these children, so trained, 
would repay the national outlay upon their education. 

" He also shewed in his system, that it was not 
necessary to separate the schools for the different classes 
of society, but that there were great advantages in 
having them near each other, as it enabled the different 
ranks to understand their true relative position, their 
mutual dependence, the necessity of the distinction of 
ranks, — of the labourer and of the capitalist, each confer- 
ring and receiving peculiar benefits, — and the corre- 
sponding necessity for a distinct course of study and 
intellectual education ; while a common moral feeling 
of kindness, charity, respect, and esteem, pervaded the 
whole, according to the Christian law, being all one in 
social harmony,— an institution never before realised, 
but now effectually so." 

Here follows a more detailed account of the agricul- 
tural improvements of Fellenberg and of his work- 
shops, which, having been spoken of at length in the 
former part of this book, need not be here repeated. 

" There is this radical difference between the agri- 
cultural improvements of Fellenberg and those of the 
rest of Europe, and even of England. They are else- 
where considered as an end, a commercial end, of 
producing a better and more profitable animal or 
crop than can be done by the old methods. He con- 
siders them only as means by which a more rational 
and contented disposition may be given to all classes 
of the community. Having increased the produce of 
his land sixfold, he considers it demonstrated, that we 
need not be alarmed at the idea of an excessive increase 
of population, provided their moral and industrial 
education be insured. Improvements cannot yet have 



92 APPENDIX. 

reached their perfection, and Europe possesses much 
land on which no improvement has begun. Industrial 
occupation must be rendered honourable, in order to 
make the labourer respect himself and be contented, 
and love and respect the institutions of his country. 
The effect of improvements hitherto has been, in a 
great degree, to render the employment of the labourer 
more difficult and uncertain, his poverty and degrada- 
tion more hopeless, and his discontent more reckless, 
because his spiritual nature has been almost entirely 
neglected. 

" We must now take a view of the higher classes of 
society, and of their education, in the relation in which 
they stand to the rest. It cannot be doubted that their 
influence for good or evil over all the other classes is 
immense and almost omnipotent, from their wealth, and 
the moral and intellectual consequences of it. For this 
very reason, from the weakness of the human mind and 
the tendency of all power to self-abuse, their position 
is the more responsible and dangerous. Though com- 
manding all other classes, they are not independent of 
them. Their power, indeed, consists in wielding the 
others as instruments ; but should these instruments 
get into other hands, as all history shews they have 
done at particular periods, the very power which was a 
security becomes a cause of ruin ; and those who direct 
this ruin can only calculate upon their own prospective 
safety by the complete annihilation, if possible, of the 
once - privileged class. All history teems with these 
lessons; but we need go no further than the French 
revolution for illustration, and that ought to be the 
more forcibly warning to us, because it threatens to be 
only the forerunner of a general European convulsion, 



PROFESSOR SCHEIDLER S SENTIMENTS. 93 

from the great similarity and consanguinity of the 
European family of nations, unless the natural relations 
of the social classes are better studied and understood, 
and unless the minds of the higher classes themselves 
are made alive to the dangers of their position on the 
one hand, and to their highest interests and duties on 
the other, which are those of the friends and guardians 
of the other classes. This can only be done through 
an improved educational sentiment, of which, indeed, 
Christianity possesses the germ, but which, it is noto- 
rious, is altogether overlooked in all the public schools 
and great gymnasia of Europe. Selfishness, and pride, 
and a contempt for the classes below them, as they are 
termed, with extreme ignorance of all useful, practical 
knowledge, and a smattering only of the classics, are 
the acknowledged characteristics of the seminaries 
where men of rank receive the usual education ; so 
that it has become almost proverbial, " that the child- 
ren of the rich generally learn nothing." These schools 
do not profess to give their pupils a choice of study. 
They make no allowance for difference of taste, ability, 
or genius ; nor do they inculcate humanity and charity, 
or benevolence, as a principle. They are limited in their 
masters or professors for the great purposes of education, 
which are the development of the character and the 
peculiar talents of individuals. 

" Fellenberg combated these evils by the number 
of professors which he invited around him. Despising 
the mercantile spirit of profit upon his pupils, which is 
the leading principle of most other establishments, (and, 
in a certain sense, almost necessarily so, money being 
the great idol and the radical vice of European society 
at present, and the portentous symptom of her threaten- 



94< APPENDIX. 

ing downfal,) lie returned with a liberal hand to his 
pupils that which they presented to him for a conven- 
tual and specific purpose. Thus, according to a pupil's 
rank, fortune, talents, or intended profession in life, 
his parents had a choice of the line of study which 
should engage his principal attention. For the same 
reasons, the classes at Hofwyl are constructed upon a 
different principle from that of any other institution. 
Sometimes a pupil studies by himself, when there is no 
other pursuing the same study or the same part of it, 
which indeed requires a greater number of teachers, 
and proportionably diminishes the profit of the super- 
intendent, or the head-master, as he is called in Eng- 
land. But the great end of education is thus, and 
thus only, obtained, which is the welfare of the pupil. 
Schools are not instituted for the sake of the master, 
but for the sake of the pupils ; and the perfection of 
the pupil's character, conduct, and intelligence, ought 
to be the only object aimed at, whether we consult the 
principles of Christianity or of common sense. 

" By the number and excellence of his professors 
Fellenberg is able to complete the education of his 
higher pupils to any extent, including in it what is 
usually considered as the last accomplishment of a 
university. Some of the most celebrated literary men 
in Europe have been professors under him ; and some 
of his pupils have reached the highest government- 
honours of their respective countries, — a proof of the 
soundness of the instruction. 

" That his institutions have attained a general cele- 
brity in Europe, though little known and less under- 
stood in England, is shewn in the fact, that sixteen 
princes have received their education there, besides the 



PROFESSOR SCHEIDLER'S SENTIMENTS. 95 

sons of men of rank and fortune in Russia, Poland, 
Germany, France, Italy, Spain, America, and some 
from England. 

" In 1799 the estate of Hofwyl consisted of five houses 
and fifteen inhabitants. The quantity of land is now 
doubled ; the produce multiplied sixfold j the buildings 
are thirteen larger and four smaller ones, capable of 
containing altogether six hundred persons ; the popula- 
tion varies from 360 to 400, which is the thousandth 
part of the population of the canton of Berne ; a num- 
ber of surrounding labourers have been employed for 
forty years ; half a million of Swiss franks have been put 
into circulation. The total number of pupils of the 
agricultural and higher scientific schools has amounted 
to 783 ; that of the poor school, the Meykirch school, 
and the girls' school, to 451 ; that of the industrial 
school to 210 ; that of the schoolmasters who receive 
instruction in the normal courses to 247. 

" When Fellenberg commenced his establishments, 
he considered, from the first, that he was working for 
the public good, and engaged in solving one of the 
most important problems which could be proposed for 
the welfare of mankind. In 1807 he declared that he 
had bequeathed them in his will to the canton, as a 
national institution. In 1831, after the government 
had recognised the entire department of education in 
all its importance, he offered to dispose of the whole to 
the state upon being paid the value of the land, pre- 
senting the buildings free, which would be a calculated 
sacrifice to himself of about 12,000Z., and to give the 
commission on whom the management might fall 5001. 
as soon as the offer was accepted. They were also to 
be allowed one year as a trial, during which a com- 



96 APPENDIX. 

mission should manage the institution as a national 
concern. This splendid and magnanimous offer was 
rejected for the most frivolous reasons, probably from 
motives of petty jealousy and envy, the plainest facts 
being denied, and the results of thirty years' labour, 
improved land and increased population, misrepre- 
sented. 

" Eellenberg wished to make Switzerland the source 
of the moral and educational regeneration of Europe, 
as her political situation and history were already re- 
markable. She stands in the centre of the nations ; 
her independence is guaranteed by the other powers ; 
she has been from early times the cradle of liberty and 
free institutions ; she produced some of the greatest of 
the early reformers, Ulrich, Zwingle, and Calvin, and 
the great Haller, the forerunner of one large depart- 
ment of modern science — botany, anatomy, and medi- 
cine ; she was the first to give birth to rational educa- 
tional inquiries and improvements, in the persons of 
Rousseau and Pestalozzi, and, lastly, of Fellenberg. 
It is not impossible that the merits of Fellenberg 
may be more fully understood, and his plans adopted. 
Though a single individual, he may become the focus 
of a light which may shine over Europe and the world. 
It is the principle of nature to commence her grand im- 
provements, discoveries, and inventions, in the bosoms 
of peculiarly distinguished individuals, and from them 
to benefit the whole world. Athens was but a single 
city, and her political power lasted a mere moment in 
the flow of time ; but her literary riches have spread 
over a succession of ages, and seem destined to live as 
long as man himself. Judaea was once the most despised 
of all lands 5 but she gave to all a moral and religious 



PROFESSOR SCHEIDLER'S SENTIMENTS. 97 

code, which must one day touch and animate every 
heart on the face of the earth. So of all great disco- 
veries, as of Guttenberg in printing, and of Jenner in 
the cow-pock, one individual sows the mustard-seed, 
which, when it has taken root, becomes the mighty 
and beneficent tree. If the spirit of the founder of 
Hofwyl should be caught by any kindred mind in any 
land, there may similar institutions arise : human nature 
continuing the same, born with the same faculties, sub- 
ject to the same laws, developed by the same methods, 
the results, if law be law, cannot fail to be the same, 
viz. the integrity of the personal character, and its per- 
fect harmony in all its relations, whether high or low, 
in whatever situation of life it may be placed ; based 
upon Christianity and morality, reverencing established 
institutions, and favourable to social order, as the only 
condition in which it can maintain its life and vigour. 
If the life of that great and good man the Emperor 
Alexander had been spared, it was his intention to 
have established in Russia an institution correspond- 
ing in all its parts with that at Hofwyl, where, by 
assembling seminaries for all classes upon one spot, 
each could have been taught its own duties, and made 
to comprehend the mutual duties and interests of the 
others. Each would have seen the necessity of such a 
distribution of ranks and employments, and the manner 
in which such an arrangement contributed to the pro- 
sperity and happiness of all. Here pride and baseness, 
tyranny and slavery, would be alike excluded ; for 
employment, occupation, and industry, in every degree, 
would be shewn to be useful and honourable. In such 
an institution only can the young statesman have 
pointed out to him the actual condition of society and 



98 APPENDIX. 

its various grades: here alone can he see the stvff of 
which mankind are made ; here alone can he see that 
every class is alike necessary and useful to the state ; 
that all are indispensable to her security, prosperity, 
and greatness ; and that if any one of them were want- 
ing, or trampled upon, or set aside, a serious injury 
would result to the community. 

" The contrast between such a place of education for 
a statesman, and that which is in general use, is suffi- 
ciently striking. In the latter, he is placed entirely with 
those of his own rank : he is accustomed to look upon 
himself and his class with a certain feeling of pride, and 
upon all the inferior classes, as they are called — those 
whom he is afterwards to govern, and whose happiness 
and welfare are to form the object of his future anxious 
life, with a degree of contempt ; ignorant, at the same 
time, of their value, their character, virtues, talents, 
wants, and rights — for rights belong to every class of men, 
even in despotic Countries, and much more in free ones. 
He then passes to a higher gymnasium or university, 
where he is, if possible, still more separated from prac- 
tical life, and more confined to the closet ; and, lastly, 
after many years of false views of human nature and of 
practical society, he has to begin the study of the facts 
of man, and to learn to honour and esteem those men, 
professions, trades, and even handicrafts, for which he 
has all his life felt a certain degree of contempt. Above 
all, he has now to learn, for the first time, (and it 
would be well if this were ever truly learnt, under such an 
isolated training,) the universal brotherhood of man ; 
that all nations are of one stock ; that every man, how- 
ever mean his outward employment, has within him the 
mmortal spirit ; that the cultivation of this spirit is the 



PROFESSOR SCHEIDLER S SENTIMENTS. 99 

true destiny of man, to which all politics are only sub- 
servient ; that the kingdoms of this world, however 
great and glorious in themselves, are as nothing in 
comparison with the glory of the spirit of man himself ; 
that they are only the form through which this spirit 
is to evolve itself; that the forms are made for the 
spirit, not the spirit for the forms. Whoever, in the 
present age, cannot enter into these views of man and 
of his social attributes, is unfit for the crisis in which 
we are placed, in which the old institutions have lost 
their authority as a principle of action ; which authority 
emanated from a simpler set of instincts, so to speak, 
and which now requires to be grounded upon rational 
conviction and reflection. There is reason in instinct, 
but the reason is not perceived while the instinct is in 
full vigour j but when it begins to flag, or pall upon 
the appetite, it requires the aid of reason to restore it 
to its former rights and influence. 

" Happy would it be if the nations of the earth, 
now that the secret of the formation of character is dis- 
closed, would prepare the way, in the language of holy 
writ, ' to learn war no more,' by controlling the passions 
and appetites in early life, by habits of early labour 
both practical and moral, by affording a proper food 
and scope for the intellectual faculties, by inculcating a 
rational respect and value for existing institutions, and^ 
above all, by the universal sanction and adoption of 
practical Christianity, and by referring the whole cha- 
racter to that simple test. 

" Such a consummation of modern society might 
seem to be Utopian and impossible, had not Fellenberg 
given the solution of it by an experience of forty years, 
and were there not strong evidences, in the midst of all 



100 APPENDIX. 

our doubts and misgivings, to those who look steadily 
below the surface to watch the under-currents, that the 
constant tendencies of man in his social relations are 
towards a better and a higher elevation, and one which, 
when attained, will be less liable to revulsion and 
relapse. 

" Happy indeed will that statesman be, and blessed 
will his name descend to posterity, who, looking 
through the mists of party to the character and nature 
of man himself, shall learn to respect and reverence 
that nature as the sublimest work of Providence ; and 
shall consider it his own highest glory, as the instru- 
ment of that Providence, to lay the foundation of such 
extended institutions as may, in their effect upon na- 
tional character, produce security for the highest classes, 
independence and content in the lowest, intelligence 
and integrity in all. For if life be not a dream, and 
the Gospel a fable, a day cannot fail of coming — we 
have it from unlying lips — when there shall reign 
' peace on earth and good-will among men.' " 



101 

MR. CROPPER'S 

AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. 

Since the preceding pages were put together, we have 
been favoured with the perusal of a small pamphlet, 
printed for private circulation, with the following title : 
" Some Account of an Agricultural School for Orphans, 
at Fearnhead, near Warrington, Lancashire ; in a Letter 
to a Friend. By James Cropper. June 1839 :" and 
as the plan can be clearly traced to the founder's ac- 
quaintance with the Swiss Institution, a notice of it 
may properly be included in this work. 

This gentleman, a member of the Society of Friends, 
wished to make an experiment in order to ascertain how 
far labour may be rendered advantageous in training 
the children of the working-classes, in connexion with 
the usual instruction given in the National or British 
schools. His establishment consists of twenty -six 
orphans, whom he collected from the neighbouring 
towns : not without difficulty, because at an early age 
children in manufacturing towns are profitable to those 
to whom they belong. Hence many of those first brought 
to him were the idle and troublesome. After a time, some 
of these, by firmness and kindness, became a credit to 
the establishment 5 others continuing unmanageable and 
incorrigible, were returned to those from whom they 
were received. A certain number of children were then 
admitted of the ages of eight and nine, with the hope 
that they could be more easily trained than older boys. 
The first difficulty was to procure a master properly 
qualified to superintend both the instruction and the 



102 APPENDIX. 

labour of the children ; and when the younger children 
were taken in, additional trouble and expense were 
incurred, as the younger children could not labour 
with the older ones, and the same master could not 
superintend the school and the field at the same time. 
Another assistant was therefore necessary. 

" I have always considered religion," says Mr. 
Cropper, " to be the basis and foundation of education 
and character; and next to this, habits of order and 
steady industry, though these are rather the develop- 
ment and proofs of religious principle, than a separate 
unconnected department. I wished at first to attain 
my object of forming the character, from motives of 
gratitude and duty alone ; but I have found by expe- 
rience, that such ignorant, neglected, and untutored 
minds, as have come under our care, require other 
more cogent and self-interested motives to induce them 
to self-exertion. I therefore appropriated to them nine 
acres of land rent-free : the whole labour of which is 
performed by themselves, under the superintendence 
of the master, who keeps an account of the labour per- 
formed by each boy, and rates and pays for it per rod, 
as if done by hired labourers. Two-thirds of what is 
thus earned is passed to the credit of the school, and 
the remainder is divided among the boys in proportion 
to the share of labour performed by each. The profits, 
if any arise from the produce, are shared by the master 
and boys: one-third being allotted to the former in 
addition to his salary, and two-thirds to the latter. 
This sum is invested for the use of the boys at a future 
day. At the end of 1838, the profit from the nine acres 
was 601., which was apportioned as above. I have since 
allotted to them about fifty acres more land, which is 



cropper's agricultural school. 103 

at present in a low state of cultivation, and for which I 
shall charge a moderate rent. The same arrangement 
is followed with these as with the nine acres ; and it is 
probable the whole profit may be double that of last 
year, which will make a profit to each boy of nearly SI. 
Up to the present time (six months), the earnings have 
been at the rate of about Ql. per annum, of which 21. 
will be placed to their credit, and 4J. to that of the 
establishment. 

" The cost of food, clothing, and education, is 121. 
per annum each ; but if the above estimate is realised, 
it will be reduced to 81. each ; and if the whole profit 
of their labour was placed to the credit of the school, 
it would reduce the cost to SI. each. My object, how- 
ever, was to serve the children ; and I thought the best 
way of doing it was to give them an interest in the 
prosperity of the concern. 

" Should the boys be disposed to pursue the employ- 
ment of agriculture, my ultimate object is to settle them 
in small farms of three acres each. If they remain with 
me till they are eighteen or nineteen, or older, it would 
both increase their pecuniary advantages, and benefit 
the establishment. If any of them, when old enough 
to judge for themselves, should prefer some other oc- 
cupation, I shall endeavour, if their conduct has been 
satisfactory, to place them suitably. It is fully under- 
stood by them, that no boy, who leaves the establish- 
ment without my approbation, will have any advan- 
tage from the money placed to his credit. 

" I will now consider that very serious and import- 
ant question, which lies at the root of the moral and 
physical improvement of the working - classes, — viz. 
how far manual labour promotes or hinders school 



104 APPENDIX. 

learning and mental cultivation with children of the 
working-classes. After the experience of several years, 
I have no hesitation in deciding that the labour, which 
occupies two-thirds of the children's time, does not pre- 
vent their acquiring a sufficient knowledge of reading, 
spelling, writing, arithmetic, together with the rudi- 
ments of grammar, geography, geometry, and natural 
history . Their acquaintance with Scripture is also con- 
siderable ; and I believe their acquirements in general 
are at least equal to those of the children of the na- 
tional or British schools. 

" We find that constant steady employment has 
a very favourable influence upon the general con- 
duct of the boys. Their favourite pursuit is field- 
labour ; but when, from the state of the weather, or 
other causes, they are more confined to school, they 
apply to their studies with much greater interest and 
cheerfulness than if they had had no intermission. We 
have indeed reason to be gratified with their improve- 
ment in every respect." 

PRACTICAL DETAILS. 

" The produce and prices of the following statement 
may possibly appear to some to be excessive ; but it 
must be recollected, that we are in those respects fa- 
vourably situated. We have a ready sale for early 
vegetables : Bolton and Manchester afford an extensive 
market ; and farther to the east there is a dense popula- 
tion, where the land is unproductive, and the crops late. 

" In 1837, being the first year of the establishment, 
potatoes averaged 362 bushels of 84 lbs. per acre. In 
1838, owing to the unfavourable season, we got only 
240 bushels per acre. 



cropper's agricultural school. 105 

" In 1837, the average crops of turnips and mangel 
wurzel were as under : 



Sown turnips .... 


. . 40 tons per acre 


Once transplanted . . 


• • 26 


Twice transplanted . . 


. . 16 


Best sown mangel . . 


. . 28 


Late ditto 


. • 13 



" The above is the weight of the roots of mangel 
wurzel, some of the leaves having been gathered whilst 
growing. In 1838, the turnips produced were, some 40 
tons per acre, some 26 ; a larger proportion 20 ; some less. 
The season was very unfavourable for mangel wurzel ; 
none of the land produced more than 14 tons of roots, 
and 19 tons of leaves per acre. 

" The average of vetches produced on an acre, during 
these two years, would keep one cow 190 days ; and 
they were cut in time to be followed by transplanted 
Swedish turnips. 

" Early potatoes, in the same time, produced from 
20Z. to 307. per acre ; autumn-sown onions much more ; 
cabbages and peas full as much as the potatoes ; — all 
of which were got off in time for a good crop of trans- 
planted Swedish turnips. 

" Strawberries and raspberries have been very pro- 
ductive. Good crops of strawberries have realised at 
the rate of 80Z. per acre ; raspberries and black currants 
have produced fully 50Z. per acre ; apples and pears, 
where the trees are in full bearing, are also likely to be 
a source of considerable profit, as well as other kinds of 
fruit in common use ; — I should suppose about 407. 
per acre." 



All the English and French publications, together 
with some German ones, on Hofwyl, have been 
consulted by the Author, who has also had the 
advantage of reading several of the letters of De 
Fellenberg, though not addressed to himself. 
The representations contained in those various 
works have been corrected by the observations 
of more recent eye-witnesses. Amongst the most 
valuable of the authorities should be named that 
of the Rev. W. C. Woodbridge, whose articles 
on Hofwyl, in the American " Annals of Educa- 
tion," deserve to be republished in England. 

If this little work be favourably received, the Author 
intends to prepare for publication some details 
of Ridolfi's Agricultural Institution, near Flo- 
rence; of the " Colonie Agricole" at Mettray, 
near Tours, in France ; and of some rural labour- 
schools in England. 



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